Arunachal and Nagaland fighting COVID-19 without a testing lab

Arunachal Pradesh and Nagaland, two states in the Northeast are fighting the fear of Coronavirus without a laboratory to test the samples of suspected patients.

Mizoram, on the other hand, got a testing laboratory only on Tuesday.

The two states are now depended on the testing laboratories in neighbouring Assam, which already reported 28 COVID-19 positive cases and tested more than 2, 000 samples. The state at present has six ICMR-accredited laboratories where 5,000 samples can be tested in a day now.

Arunachal has reported one positive case so far but no positive case has been reported in Nagaland as on Wednesday.

As most states are going for more tests to detect the positive cases, lack of a testing laboratory has affected the same in the two states, health officials said.

Nagaland has conducted tests on 61 samples so far while the same is about 85 in Arunachal Pradesh. "We need a testing laboratory to do more tests. People became more worried after a man in Lohit district, who returned from Nizamuddin congregation tested positive. But without tests, it is difficult to identify those who got infected from him but are asymptomatic," said a source in Arunachal Pradesh.

Spokesperson of Nagaland government, Neiba Kronu on Tuesday said the state government was fast-tracking efforts to set up two testing laboratories, one each in Kohima and Dimapur. Of the 61 samples the state sent for tests to Assam, 48 samples tested negative, while reports of 13 are still awaited.

The minister said a total of 5,069 persons declared their travel history (till March 6) so far.