Amid rise in coronavirus cases in Mumbai, the number of daily COVID-19 tests have gone down in June.
According to a report by Mumbai Mirror, the city averaged a mere 4,237 reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) tests a day in June. Meanwhile, BMC chief Iqbal Chahal told the leading daily that the testing capacity of labs in the city was around 5,000 samples, despite tall claims.
“These labs claimed that they could test 10,000 to 12,000 samples a day. I have had a meeting with labs and asked them to ramp up testing and ensure that results are given in 24 hours. Delays in testing can lead to delays in reporting cases and even hamper treatment,” Chahal told Mumbai Mirror.
Earlier, BJP leader Devendra Fadnavis demanded increasing the number of coronavirus tests in Maharashtra and expressed concern over what he called the delay in reporting of deaths caused by the infection.
He alleged the state is conducting less number of tests to suppress coronavirus infection figures. The leader of opposition in the assembly, in a letter to chief minister Uddhav Thackeray, said, the state needs to increase the number of tests so that more and more people with coronavirus infection could be detected.
Meanwhile, With 1,372 new patients coming to light, the tally of coronavirus cases in Mumbai increased to 81,634 on Friday, a Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) release said. With 73 deaths, death toll in the country's financial capital rose to 4,759, it added.
Notably, the number of new cases came down compared to the last two days. On July 1 and July 2, the city had recorded 1,511 and 1,554 new COVID-19 cases. The number of recovered COVID-19 patients increased to 52,392 as another 1,698 patients were discharged from city hospitals in the past 24 hours, said the BMC. There are 24,483 active COVID-19 patients in Mumbai now while 1,139 new suspected patients were admitted to hospitals.
