Some of the Covid-19 test laboratories are conducting tests below their capacity and some have seen a drop in the average number of samples received in a day, health department sources said.

At least two test laboratories — one private and another government-run — have received fewer samples in the past few days.

“The number of samples received has gone down to around 20 on an average over the past few days,” said an official of the private laboratory that had been conducting 70 to 89 tests a day till a week ago.

The government-run laboratory is now testing around 80 samples a day, down from 100, sources said.

The National Institute of Cholera and Enteric Diseases (Niced) has been conducting over 150 tests a day for the past few days, Shanta Dutta, the director of Niced, said. The laboratory is equipped to conduct 250 tests in a day.

“We are testing over 150 samples per day for the past few days.... We had tested 250 samples one day. That would be our maximum capacity to test in a day. We cannot test more than 250 samples in a day,” Dutta said.

A Niced official said 169 samples were tested between Thursday and Friday and 160 samples were tested between Monday (April 13) and Wednesday (April 15).

The state, till Sunday, had the capacity to conduct approximately 600 tests a day but around 400 were being done because not enough samples were received, a health department official said.

A senior government officials put the state’s testing capacity at “around 500-plus”. “But it takes time to reach the optimum capacity,” he added.

Metro spoke to several officials of the health department and government hospitals and also with public health experts to find out the possible reasons for fewer samples being sent.

Are test protocols being followed strictly?

No, said a section of health officials and public health experts.

In hot spots or clusters, people with flu-like symptoms — fever, cough, sore throat or runny nose — must be tested, the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) guidelines state.

This is besides all symptomatic contacts of people who have tested positive for Covid-19, all symptomatic health-care workers, all patients with symptoms of severe acute respiratory illness (SARI) such as fever, cough or shortness of breath. Asymptomatic direct and high-risk contacts of positive cases should also be tested between the fourth and fifth days of coming in contact with the infected person.

Anyone with travel history must also be tested but this proportion is negligible now because of the ongoing lockdown, where domestic and international travel has stopped.

The state government had said on Saturday that it has increased tests in the containment zones of Calcutta, Howrah, North 24-Parganas and East Midnapore.

But doctors at both government and private hospitals and clinics are not sending every person with mild symptoms of flu for Covid-19 test if they are outside the containment zones officials said.

“There are some doctors and hospital officials who don’t seem to be clear about who to send for tests. In many cases, they are using their personal discretion,” said a senior health official. “Many of them feel people are not travelling because of the lockdown and so they are not sending residents if areas where cases have not been reported for tests even if they have flu-like symptoms.”

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“But we are trying to explain to these doctors that they have to follow the protocol. There is also some communication gap within the healthcare system and we need a uniform standard operating procedure that should be followed by all,” the official said.

More people queuing up at the fever clinics of government and private hospitals should be sent for testing, another official said.

The Calcutta Municipal Corporation has started door-to-door surveillance to seek out anyone with fever.

“We are sending reports to the health department and if they tell us to send someone for test, we are doing so,' a civic official said.

Fear factor

Fear of being quarantined and social stigma was another reason for fewer people getting tested, health officials said.

The number of people reporting at the fever clinics set up at government and private hospitals across the city and districts has either dropped or remained static.

SSKM Hospital’s fever clinic has seen a drop from 120 people in the initial days of the lockdown to about 40 now, a hospital official said.

At Belle Vue Clinic on Loudon Street, barely four people turn up in a day.

Lack of transport because of the lockdown could also be another reason for people seeking doctor’s advice over phone instead of going to a clinic.

More test centres

The number of Covid-19 testing centres has increased and state government officials said this could have resulted in distribution of the samples.

“Earlier, samples from the Calcutta Medical College and Hospital were being sent to SSKM. But now, the School of Tropical Medicine is also conducting tests and so the samples from the Calcutta Medical College are being sent there,” a health department official said.

But some officials argued more centres should mean more tests. “The problem is, all centres are not testing to their optimum capacity,” an official said.

The state government has said initially 50 to 60 samples were being tested everyday. Now, the number has increased to 400 every day on an average.