The second phase of Sero survey has begun in three Jharkhand districts to gauge the prevalence of SARS-COV-2 virus in the State, health officials said on Thursday. The survey is being conducted in Latehar, Simdega and Pakur districts, and samples of at least 400 people in each district will be collected for the same, officials added.
During the first phase of Sero survey, samples were collected from these three districts in the month of May. Later, in June, serum samples of people in Ranchi, Bokaro, Dhanbad, Dumka, East Singhbhum, Garhwa, Hazaribag, Khunti, Palamu and West Singhbhum were collected.
“Once the samples are collected in Latehar, Simdega and Pakur, the survey teams will move to the remaining 10 districts, which were surveyed in the first phase,” said National Health Mission (NHM) state director Ravi Shankar Shukla. “The survey results should be out in 15 to 20 days,” he added.The first phase of the survey concluded that there was no community transmission of Covid-19 virus in state as only 0.63 per cent people in Jharkhand had developed antibodies after getting exposed to the Covid-19 virus. It found that sero-prevalence in Jharkhand ranged from 0.43 per cent to 0.9 per cent, which according to the government, was “very low”, and indicative of exposure of Covid-19 virus to less than one person per 100. However, as per government figures, Jharkhand had reported only 2490 cases of Covid infection by the end of June. Cut to August 20, the Covid tally in state has leaped to 26,421, which is ten-times higher than the count of cases in June. Nearly 1000 cases of infection have surfaced every day in Jharkhand in the past fortnight, indicating that the virus was fast spreading among the urban and rural populace of the tribal state, say health experts.
In the second phase, random households and population samples from 13 districts will be selected for the survey by experts from Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) and Government of India.
Each district will be divided in 10 clusters and at least 40 samples will be collected from each cluster for the survey, said heath officials, adding that survey teams were sent to the three districts on Tuesday itself.
According to experts, Sero survey aims at collecting serum samples from a relevant group of people to check if they have developed antibody to fight an antigen, which in this case was the Covid-19 virus. The survey indicates extent to which the population of a district or a state was exposed to a virus.