Maharashtra Reduces Cost Of RT-PCR Test To Check Covid Infection

Maharashtra has reduced the price for testing coronavirus infection using the RT-PCR method by up to 18 per cent. In an order on Monday, the Maharashtra government said it reduced the price to encourage more testing for the highly infectious virus.

The cost of sample collection from designated sites, transportation and generating a report has been reduced from Rs 1,200 to Rs 980.

The cost of test samples collected from kiosks, quarantine centres, hospitals, clinics and COVID-19 care centres has been reduced from Rs 1,600 to Rs 1,400. The charge for test sample collection from home has been reduced from Rs 2,000 to Rs 1,800.

"While Rs 900 will be the cost that can be levied by pathological laboratories, charges for tests conducted through laboratories at COVID-19 centres, hospitals and quarantine centres will be Rs 1400. A rate of Rs 1,800 has been allowed for testing samples collected from homes," the state government said in a statement.

It said the state has been testing 70,000 per one million people and efforts are on to raise the number of tests.

RT-PCR test has a specificity rate (ability to identify those without the disease) of nearly 100 per cent whereas the sensitivity rate (ability to identify those with the disease) of about 67 per cent. This means, RT-PCR test will not give false positives but there are 30-35 per cent chances of getting false negatives. RT-PCR test is still considered the gold standard for testing.

New coronavirus infections reported in India in a span of 24 hours dropped below 50,000 for the second time this month, while the new fatalities registered during the same period fell under 500 after 108 days, according to the Union Health Ministry data updated on Monday.

India's COVID-19 caseload mounted to 79,09,959 with 45,148 new infections being reported in a day. The deaths climbed to 1,19,014 with 480 new fatalities, the data updated at 8 am showed. A total of 71,37,228 people have recuperated from COVID-19 so far pushing the national recovery rate to 90.23 per cent while the case fatality rate has dropped to 1.50 per cent.