Need to quickly ramp up testing, open vaccination to 18-45 years age group, FICCI tells government

Representative image: AP

Pointing out that official testing for the COVID-19 has fallen below optimal levels achieved earlier this year and that testing capacity is lying underutilized, industry body FICCI has called for revitalizing testing nationwide. It has also asked the government to open vaccination to the 18-45 years age group.

In a letter written to Health Minister Harsh Vardhan, FICCI President Uday Shankar said India is currently testing about 11 lakh samples a day, while it had reached the level of testing 15 lakh samples a day in January.

"Further, there is capacity of performing much more tests with 2440 labs in the country operational for COVID testing, including more than 1200 from the private sector," Shankar wrote. He added that states may be advised to utilize the facilities in the private sector to the maximum to achieve the desired testing capacity.

Shankar also batted for opening up vaccination to the 18-45 years age group. "This group has been acting as the superspreaders of infection in the country. One of the recent analysis in Tamil Nadu has demonstrated that people in the 18-45 age group accounted for 51 percent of the recent surge in coronavirus cases," he said.

Pointing out that that there is no shortage of vaccines and there is a huge scope of augmenting inoculation capacity through greater involvement of private sector, he urged the government to open up vaccination for the age group to curb rapidly rising coronavirus cases.

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India achieved a milestone in its vaccination drive with the highest ever single day figure of more than 36.7 lakh vaccination being done on April 2. But this may not be enough as at the same time, there has been an equal distress on the rising number of cases of infection. The current COVID case growth rate of 6.8 percent in March, has surpassed the previous record of 5.5 percent, Shankar stressed.

On April 2, India recorded the highest daily rise in six months with 88,665 new cases.

While eateries, bars and restaurants in Pune district has been shut for seven days starting April 3, Maharashtra Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray  on April 2 warned there could be shortage of healthcare infrastructure if situation deteriorates. Mumbai alone reported 8,832 new COVID-19 cases on that day, the highest one-day rise since the pandemic began.

Night curfews have also been announced across 10 districts in Odisha from April 5 while Himachal Pradesh has shut schools and restrictions on movement and outside activity has been reimposed in Karnataka.

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