TheIndian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) has revised its strategy to fight thespread of the new coronavirus on Saturday, saying all hospitalized patientswith severe acute respiratory illness, shortness of breath and having fever andcough will now be tested for COVID-19 infection.
The new ICMR guidelines also said asymptomatic direct and high-risk contacts of a confirmed case should be tested once between day 5 and day 14 of coming in his/her contact.
The apex body for biomedical research revised its strategy in view of a spurt in coronavirus cases in the country this week. The new strategy aims to contain the spread of infection more effectively and to provide a reliable diagnosis to all individuals meeting the inclusion criteria of COVID-19 testing.
As per the guidelines, till now, all asymptomatic individuals who undertook international travel in the last 14 days and developed symptoms, all symptomatic contacts of laboratory-confirmed cases and all symptomatic health care workers were being tested for the infection.
The coronavirus cases rose to 271 on Saturday in India with fresh cases being reported from various parts of the country.
India has so far witnessed cases of COVID-19 mostly related to travel and local transmission from imported cases. Community transmission of the disease has not been documented until now.
Thetesting strategy is reviewed by the National Task Force constituted by SecretaryDHR & DG, ICMR and Chaired by VK Paul, a member of the NITI Aayog.
