Delhi ranks number one for testing its residents for COVID-19

New Delhi: Delhi ranks number one for testing its residents for COVID-19, according to official data. While India's national average Test-Per-Million (TPM) status stands at 590 (samples tested), Delhi's TPM stood at 2147, state data revealed.

Vice-chairperson of DDC, Jasmine Shah in a tweet on Tuesday said: "Delhi becomes the first state in India to cross 2000 tests/million. At 2147, it's way ahead of the India average of 530 tests/million. Aggressive testing is essential to contain the spread of COVID-19, yet no pressure from Centre on states that lag way behind. Is that by design?"

The last countrywide analysis of testing showed a considerable improvement in identifying new cases in states like Delhi, Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu and Rajasthan.

According to a report, in terms of expanding testing across the population in around a fortnight, Delhi's TPMs rose from 696 on April 12 to 1,760 on April 25; according to data compiled from the state government and ICMR statistics. TPM indicates population covered by testing. Given India's population of 130 crore, TPM will be low compared to other countries where the population is quite low. Similarly, Indian states that are less populous will have a low TPM compared to others. Factors like availability of testing kits, labs and testing capacity per day also affect the TPM.