Assam Starts Rapid Virus Testing, Extends Quarantine Period To 28 Days

The Assam government has started using the rapid testing kits, days after the centre asked the states to temporarily halt the usage. The state has also decided to increase the quarantine period from fourteen to twenty-eight days for those who come in contact with COVID-19 patients.

The state received 9,600 kits from the centre and had ordered a lakh of its own. On Thursday, it used 100 kits for testing in Guwahati's Spanish Garden apartments, the lone containment zone in the city.

"We will deploy our rapid tests kits in government hospital, in containment zones, and buffer zones so that we can keep checking randomly if there is a community transmission or not. But ICMR (Indian Council of Medical Research) has given a guideline that this can be used for only surveillance and not as confirmatory tests," Assam minister Himanta Biswa Sarma said.

The rapid tests use blood to determine whether the body has developed antibodies for coronavirus, which is the final evidence that a person is infected and works even for people who are asymptomatic.
But the test is not likely to work in the window period between infection and the body's development of antibodies.

Assam today got a coronavirus positive case after a week.

"The ICMR has now said that if some patients have come in direct contact with a positive patient or they stay together in the same house then they have to be quarantined for 28 days. Today we got a new COVID positive patient nineteen days after the person came in contact with a COVID 19 positive patient. Thus, in view of public health consideration, we have decided to extend the quarantine period to 28 days," Mr Sarma added.

Assam has reported 35 coronavirus cases, including one death.