India's current coronavirus testing rate 6 times the WHO recommendation: Govt
India is conducting coronavirus tests at a rate of 875 per million population per day, which is more than six times the figure recommended by the World Health Organization (WHO), Lok Sabha was informed on Wednesday. The WHO has recommended testing of 0.14 samples per day per 1,000 population or 140 tests per day per million population, Union Minister of State for Health Ashwini Choubey said in a written reply in Lok Sabha.
In response to another question, Choubey said that average test conducted by a district in a day is 1,053.
"Presently, the rate of COVID-19 test conducted per 1,000 persons in India is 0.875 test per day (as on September 19)," he said in response to a question on whether the rate of tests is commensurate with testing levels in countries with similar number of active COVID-19 cases.
On whether the government is tracking the testing numbers at the district level, the minister said that tests conducted for detection of COVID-19 are being reported to the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) data portal by laboratories, including the details of district where the sample was collected and tested.
(With Inputs from PTI)
