State seeks monitoring of at-home Covid test kits, reporting of results

Worried about Covid cases going unreported, the state has asked districts and civic corporations to monitor the sale of at-home testing kits and ensure that people using them report test results to the authorities.

- Sumitra.DebRoy

Mumbai: Worried about Covid cases going unreported, the state has asked districts and civic corporations to monitor the sale of at-home testing kits and ensure that people using them report test results to the authorities. They have been asked to work with the Food and Drug Administration and rope in chemists to educate users about the importance of registering results. The BMC is likely to come out with guidelines for at-home kits on Thursday.

The use of rapid self-test kits has seen a massive jump since the Omicron surge began. As the waiting time for RT-PCR tests soared with the swelling in sample load, many turned to self-administered test kits that can deliver results in 15-20 minutes. But given that reporting is effectively voluntary, most positive cases were not reported. The BMC was informed of barely 98,000 tests from August to December. Meanwhile, lakhs of kits have been sold in the city in the past 20 days.