We're increasing labs, need more testing kits: Maha minister

Maharashtra Medical EducationMinister Amit Deshmukh on Monday stressed on the need forextra testing kits as the state has the highest number ofCOVID-19 patients in the country

Incidentally, the number of cases in the state jumpedfrom 4,666 on April 21 to 8,068 six days later

Responding to a query on the spike, Deshmukh said, "Itis true that the numbers are rising steeply. We want more kitsto test as many people as possible for coronavirus. There are40 labs in the state and we are increasing it to 60. Then wecan increase the number of tests from the 7,000 we do on anaverage daily." Speaking on faulty rapid test kits, which has been abane for many states in the fight against the outbreak,Deshmukh said, "Maharashtra has also received some faulty kitsbut the numbers are not as high as Gujarat." The Indian Council of Medical Research has said thatthe rapid antibody blood test kits must be used only forsurveillance purpose and also asked states to not use kitsprovided by two Chinese firms as "results have shown widevariation in sensitivity".