One crore test in the four months, Should we call it a big achievement' of feel sorry for our poor health system.

One Crore COVID-19 testing in past 4 months, now 3.5 lakhs in a day.

One Crore Covid-19 Test in the past Four months. Now 3.5 Lakhs in a day. Should we call it a “big achievement’ of the Indian Government or does it exposes our poor health management system?.

If we do testing at this pace, it would take 10 years to test our entire population. We may celebrate what Government call it a ‘Big achievement’, But actually it is time to feel sorry for our Health care the system.

It is time to mull over how many years we would take to treat our patient from this pandemic if it takes 10 years to test our entire population.

Here are a few testing figures of some of the worst affected countries.

The US with a population of 33 Crore, did nearly four crore tests  almost 11.5 % of its population.

Russia more than two crore tests for its 14.5 crore population—almost 14.7 % of its population.

The UK, more than one crore for a population of nearly 7 crore—against 15.6 % of its population.

Spain did nearly 6o lakhs tests for its population of 4.6 crores —12.5 % of its population.

Italy 5.6 crore tests for its population of 6 crores-- 9 % of its population.

Now see India where it stands. One crore tests for 138 crore population—0.7 % of its population.

Which means we have done

16 times less test than USA,

21 times less than Russia

22 times less than US

17 times less than Spain

And nearly 13 times less tests than Italy.

Should we claim to call it a ‘significant achievement’ of the Indian Government?

Some people may still find a positive Answer to this straight question. Let's see how.

For them. We might be many times behind than many developed countries, So What, yet we slightly better than Pakistan, Bangladesh, Srilanka, Bhutan, Nepal…. Etcs.

While India has done nearly 7400 tests per million, it is performing marginally better than our Pakistan (6500 tests per million), Bangladesh (5300 per million), Sri Landa, Afghanistan (1900 per million), Nigeria (742 per million), Nepal and Bhutan….

Now we have reasons to celebrate as well as to feel sorry for our system. It is for you to see how to take it.

India pay pat its back saying it accorded importance to widespread testing and focussed  on “Test, Trace, Treat” strategy. It is testing 3.46 lakh samples in a day—yet, if we continue with this pace it would take nearly 10 years to test our entire population.

 

Presently India has increased its testing capacity-- more than 1105 labs have been created especially to test COVID 19 patients

Consistent and focussed efforts for containment and management of COVID-19 by Government of India along with the States/UTs have led to the number of recovered cases among COVID-19 patients rise to 4,24,432 as of today. During the last 24 hours, a total of 15,350 COVID-19 patients have been cured.

BY Vijay Thakur, Special Representative, The Statesman, vijaythakurx@gmail.com