BMC flags reduced COVID testing in Mumbai; urges people to get tested to 'flush out virus'

Flagging the low number of tests conducted on Sunday, BMC commissioner Iqbal Chahal on Monday, urged citizens to come forward and get tested for COVID, highlighting that maximum people need to get tested to 'flush out Coronavirus from Mumbai'. Chahal highlighted how Mumbai's testing had peaked at  56,000 tests in April with its average being 44,000. Noting that in the past few days average testing has fallen to 38,000 and 28,000 yesterday, he said that there was a need to increase the testing to 40,000 per day at least.

BMC commissioner flags low testing

He stated, "Our aggressive testing policy has resulted in reduction of positivity rate. This might have reduced the natural demand for home collection of swabs by our citizens in the last few days. It has been observed that the testing figures have fallen in last few days from   50,000 + to 38000 day before & 28,000 yesterday. It’s likely to fall further during weekends. We need to increase the testing to 40,000 per day,at least,if not more. May I request you to appeal to our eminent citizens to come forward & test themselves to increase Covid testing to the maximum possible level."

Mumbai's reduced testing

On Sunday, with just 28,636 samples tested in 24 hours, Mumbai on Sunday reported 3672 new COVID cases and 79 deaths. With 5542 new recoveries, cured tally rose to 5,83,873. Mumbai has 6,56,204 cases of which 57,342 are active and 13,330 fatalities. Mumbai's recovery rate has risen to 89% now while its growth rise has soared to 0.66% amid strict lockdown. BMC reported that 54,90,241 samples have been tested till date with an 11.89% positivity rate. 

Writing to CM Uddhav Thackeray, LoP Devendra Fadnavis pointed out that the average daily testing in the city in the last 8 days is 40,760, he claimed that the proportion of RT-PCR tests in the overall testing is just 40%. With Mumbai and Maharashtra consistently recording a positivity rate of 14-18% and 25-27% respectively, Fadnavis contended that reduced testing and fewer RT-PCR tests will not help convey the reality. Citing data from April 25 and 26, the former Maharashtra CM lamented that the state government was not abiding by the Centre's directive on scaling up the proportion of RT-PCR tests to at least 70%. While acknowledging that everyone wants the COVID-19 situation to improve, he advised against propagating a misleading narrative.