Facing flak for long delays in arrivals of test reports of swine flu, the state health department is now planning to install swine flu testing facility at Government Doon Medical College. This comes after concern expressed by Chief Minister Trivendra Singh Rawat on the issue.
Taking cognizance of the absence of swine flu testing mechanism in the state, the Chief Minister (CM) of Uttarakhand, Trivendra Singh Rawat had reportedly asked the officials to ensure that the facility to test swine flu samples is set up in the state.
The CM on Wednesday had directed his advisor Naveen Balooni to initiate the process of the H1 N 1 test in Uttarakhand. He expressed concern over delay in arrivals of the test reports of the suspected cases of swine flu in the State. On the orders of CM, Dr Balooni held discussion with the Director General (DG) Health services Dr D S Rawat at health directorate. It was decided laboratory of GDMC can be upgraded for swine flu test.
At present the samples of the suspected patients of swine flu are sent to the National Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) based at New Delhi. It is learnt that the NCDC is so packed up with samples of suspected patients these days that the process of tests and sending the reports is taking unusually more time. In many cases the test reports of some of the patients suffering from the disease arrive after their deaths.
The delay in arrival of reports of swine flu tests from Delhi is causing problems to the health department officials, doctors treating these patients and their anxious family members. It is worth mentioning here that the molecular laboratory of the Mahant Indiresh hospital in Dehradun is approved by the NCDC to conduct swine flu tests. This hospital had in past shown interest that the state health department enters in some sort of understanding with it to test the samples of the suspected patients of swine flu. However the plan could not materialize as the state health department gets the samples tested free of cost at NCDC New Delhi.