Govt committed to doubling tests, don't see why we needed MHA go-ahead: Jain

New Delhi: The Delhi government's short feud with the Ministry of Home Affairs came to an end on Friday after health minister Satyendar Jain confirmed to reporters here that he was glad the MHA had clarified the issue and given the go-ahead to double daily testing numbers.

The Capital reported 1,808 fresh COVID-19 cases on Friday, taking the city's tally to over 1.69 lakh, while the death toll from the disease rose to 4,389. This is the second successive day when over 1,800 new cases have been reported in August.

Moreover, official documents showed that the Principal Health Secretary Vikram Dev Dutt, who was central to the controversy of whether the Centre was stopping Delhi from increasing testing numbers, had, in fact, sought the MHA expert panel's opinion on how this objective could be achieved in a week's time, as announced by Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal.

Jain had on Thursday accused MHA officials of pressuring the Delhi government into not increasing the testing number — a charge promptly and strongly denied by the Home Ministry. He had written to Home Secretary Ajay Bhalla that when Dutt was asked why he had directed officials to maintain the status quo on testing, he had allegedly said he was pressured by MHA officials.

However, when asked if such permission in writing from the MHA was required despite Kejriwal issuing orders to double the testing, Jain said, it was "unfortunate" and "no question arises as to why should it be needed".

Meanwhile, sources claimed that Chief Secretary Vijay Dev and Dutt have gone on leave, however, there was no official confirmation.

Explaining how the Delhi government plans to ramp up testing numbers, Jain told reporters that they would use their network of 300 dispensaries and hospitals and start aggressive contact tracing.

The health minister said the Delhi government is committed to doubling the COVID-19 test from the present 20,000 per day to 40,000 per day within a week in the national Capital.

Twenty fatalities have been recorded in the last 24 hours, according to the latest bulletin issued by the Delhi health department, which also showed that a total of 22,933 tests were conducted in the last 24 hours, of which 6,920 were RT-PCR and 16,013 were rapid antigen tests. Furthermore, hospital occupancy in the city also went up slightly with now a little over 10,200 COVID-19 beds left vacant.

"People can have free COVID-19 tests at the dispensaries whose time has been extended to five hours from 9 am to 2 pm. Even if dispensaries conduct on average 100 tests and hospitals 200 tests per day, the target of scaling up testing to daily 40,000 from the currently around 20,000, will be met," he said when asked how the government plans to scale up testing in the city. He added that 300 dispensaries and hospitals are conducting free COVID-19 presently. Jain said the government has the availability of the adequate number of kits to double the testing to 40,000 per day.

"Presently, out of 3,700 corona patients in Delhi government hospitals, around 30 per cent patients are from other states. Also, the number of tests were lower as people stayed home during the recent festivals. Now tests have increased and so has the number of positive cases," he said.

His comments come days after Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal said COVID-19 tests will be doubled in view of the "marginal" increase in coronavirus cases in the city.

The health minister said Delhi was still "halfway behind" the peak of the pandemic and the rise in number of positive cases in last few days was not a second wave of the COVID-19 infection as claimed by some experts.

"The asymptomatic cases are tested through the rapid antigen test which takes around 30 minutes. There can not be a fixed ratio of rapid tests

and RTPCR test which is employed for symptomatic patients," he said.