The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) has decided to set up a free COVID-19 antigen test camp on September 1-2 in Dadar and Mahim due to the high number of cases in the area.
The Rapid Antigen tests are immunoassays that detect the presence of a specific viral antigen, which implies the current viral infection. Along with door-to-door fever checks, camps have been organized at Gokhale road in Dadar on September 1. The same camp will be held at Welkarwadi health post at Mahim from 10 am to 11.30 am on September 2 and Welkarwadi Dispensary from 11.30 am to 1 pm.
The BMC back in July had directed the assistant municipal commissioners in Mumbai to take the help of private laboratories to conduct at least 250 tests for the coronavirus every day. This came after the civic body had procured close to one lakh antigen testing kits, which were able to produce results within a period of 30 minutes. It was decided that priority was to be given to the wards located in the suburbs where the cases of coronavirus have been on a rise.
These testing kits have also been distributed to civic medical colleges and hospitals, and the Deans of these colleges have been asked to conduct testing as per the guidelines authorized by the ICMR, without comprising the optimization of Reverse Transcription Polymerase Chain Reaction (RT PCR) tests in laboratories.
Meanwhile, Maharashtra has recorded 11,852 fresh cases of the novel coronavirus, propelling the state's COVID-19 tally to 7,92,541. The positivity rate, recovery rate, and fatality rate for the coronavirus in Maharashtra stand at 19.14 per cent, 72.37 per cent, and 3.1 per cent respectively.
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