Nearly two weeks after Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai announced that the daily tests will be increased to 30,000 in the State, districts have not been able to even conduct half of this number.
This is mainly because the Indian Council of Medical Research’s (ICMR) circular on purposive testing strategy - under which only at risk and symptomatic contacts of the infected persons should be tested - still holds good. District authorities said they are not finding enough people meeting this requirement for testing.
Following Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s video-conference with Chief Ministers of all States on April 27, Mr. Bommai had announced that the COVID situation is under control in Karnataka. However, as the test positivity rate (TPR) had slightly increased since the first week of April, testing would be ramped up in the State, he had said.
