Tuesday, May 12, 2020

Sero Survey by ICMR and NCDC


The Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) and NCDC (National Centre for Disease Control) are to conduct a sero survey. The survey will help to learn about the prevalence of COVID-19 infection.

What is a Sero Survey?

  • A Sero Survey is testing of blood serum of individuals and determine the presence of antibodies against COVID-19.

Significance

  • The survey is to be conducted in 10 health facilities initially. 
  • After validating its success, it will be implemented in other regions of the country.
  • The Government of India intends to set up a systematic surveillance system. 
  • The sero survey will help in framing a mechanism to achieve this.

About the survey

  • The survey is to test 200 samples in a week. 
  • It will focus on pregnant women, out patients, that is, more of low-risk groups. 
  • The health care professionals will be selected from high-risk population. 
  • The survey will also collect samples of nasal and throat swabs to run RT-PCR tests. 
  • Pool Testing is to adopted while testing these collected samples.

Pool Testing

  • In Pool Testing, 4 to 5 swabs of the collected samples will be tested for the virus. 
  • This is done to save time. When, the test run shows positive results, the swabs will be run individually.

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