Fill out the online form, drive to the designated collection center, show your identification, roll down the window, tilt your head back to allow swab samples to be collected from your throat and nose, and leave – a suspected coronavirus disease ( Covid-19) can now be tested in these simple steps at the drive-through center of a private laboratory in western Delhi.
So far, the central government has allowed about three dozen private laboratory chains to detect Covid-19 cases. Experts say this is important to strengthen testing to flatten the disease curve. However, the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) only allows symptomatic people with a history of travel, medical staff, people with severe respiratory diseases, and people who have direct contact with confirmed cases to be tested. Those close to private facilities need to obtain a doctor's prescription according to these guidelines to be eligible for testing.
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On Monday, the Punjab Bagh branch of Dangs Lab-one of the eight private laboratories approved by the city-organized a simulation run of its drive-through facility. Considering privacy and security issues, it is impossible to conduct interviews and interactions with suspected cases.
The drive-through testing process starts at home. People with symptoms can use the laboratory’s website to fill out an online form that contains personal details, the preferred date of sample collection, details of the doctor who recommended the test, and clinical symptoms. The person also needs to submit the registration number, brand and color of the car they intend to use.
After the appointment is completed and online payment is made, the laboratory will call a confirmation call and send an email with detailed information about the process.
The facility is located on a 100-foot-long street outside the Bagsey Central Market Laboratory in Punjab. The entrances and exits are controlled by iron chains managed by security personnel. Several signs were fixed along this road to guide the suspected patient through the entire process.
When the car arrived at the simulation center on Monday, a guard checked the driver’s identity and license plate in a form submitted online. The car’s parking lights must be turned on-these instructions are sent via email after booking. When the guard put down the chain to let the car pass, a sanitation worker in overalls sprayed the road with disinfectant. No words were exchanged.
The car drove into a 15-foot by 6-foot rectangular painted area, and a technician wearing personal protective equipment (PPE) approached the driver with a placard, instructed him to lower the window, tilt his head back, and Allow to collect swab samples from his throat and nose.
The technician removes the swab from the packaging bag, collects a sample from the nose for about 5 seconds, and then puts the swab into a cylindrical container. Repeat the process with your throat.
The fake patient rolled up the car window, and the guard put down the chain to let him drive away. The sample collection process takes less than five minutes.
Then, another technician wrapped the samples in cotton gauze, put them in a larger cylindrical plastic container, and then stored them in an incubator filled with ice packs. This process took another five minutes.
A maximum of two people are allowed to occupy a car during the test. If the car driver is not a patient, he or she must sit on the right side of the back seat to facilitate the collection of swab samples. Patients will receive results via email and phone within 36 hours. The test cost is approximately 4,500.
To be sure, since the collection center is running a simulated collection process, no actual test was conducted for this news report.
Arjun Dang, CEO of Dr. Dangs Lab, said the drive-through facility is considering serving 25-35 patients a day, allocating 20 minutes to each patient. "It will run from 8:30 am to 4:30 pm, but if demand increases, we may increase the time," he said, adding that there have been about 12 since the appointment began late Sunday afternoon. People signed up for the test.
Zoya Brar, CEO and founder of CORE Diagnostics, a private laboratory approved by ICMR, said: "I appreciate that Dr. Dangs copied the work done in Korea and elsewhere to expand the scope of testing. Finally, we focused on providing home Collect, because this is the minimum contact between the patient and the outside world. We do this by default in all situations."
Although another private laboratory chain stated that they are evaluating the process of starting a similar testing procedure, another laboratory did not comment on the matter. The third laboratory stated that it has no immediate plans to activate drive-through testing facilities.
Public health experts say that extensive and aggressive testing and social distancing are the only ways to control the outbreak of this new disease. Large-scale testing, mainly carried out by drive-through centers, is touted as the main reason why South Korea can slow the spread of this highly infectious disease, which has caused at least 71,000 deaths worldwide.
At some point in March, South Korea had the second largest outbreak after China, but the country has since managed to flatten the infection curve. After the initial delay, the United States also began extensive drive-through testing to control pathogens that have infected more than 330,000 people in the country.
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