South Korea-style testing kiosks debut in TN

A medical team sits inside the clinical kiosk at the entrance of the Government Hospital in Tiruppur where anyone can get screened. If the healthcare professionals feel the person needs to be tested for COVID-19, he is sent to the second booth – the testing kiosk outside the quarantine centre.

Once the swab samples are collected, the person is sent to the isolation ward. Welcome to the South Korea-style testing method introduced in the knitwear hub of Tiruppur for the first time in Tamil Nadu, which stands second in the number of COVID-19 cases in the country at 690.

The testing kiosks – clinical and sample collection – is a first-of-its-kind because the potential patients are sent after initial screening by doctors. The kiosks came into being at the Government Hospital on Wednesday with people turning up to get tested. Tiruppur district has 20 COVID-19 patients so far.

The Tiruppur District administration has been at the forefront of adopting innovative methods to tackle COVID-19. Last week, the district launched India’s first disinfection tunnel at a cost of Rs 90,000 and it has now been replicated across India.

The kiosks cost Rs 1 lakh each and they allow healthcare professions to use gloves attached to the booth to collect swab samples from people who are asked to sit outside the kiosk. The chair on which the person sits for collection of his samples will be disinfected immediately after the test is over.

“This is the first time in the country that we have two kiosks. One for screening and another for testing. In a country like ours, we cannot have direct testing kiosks because of the population. So, we decided to have a screening kiosk where people will first be checked to ascertain whether they need a test,” Tiruppur District Collector Dr K Vijayakarthikeyan told DH.

Once the samples are collected, the persons tested are sent to the quarantine facility inside the hospital. The kiosks would help healthcare professionals collect anywhere between 40 and 50 samples in an hour.

He said the number of kiosks would be increased after TN gets rapid test kits from China. “Once we get the rapid test kits which will allow us to get results in half an hour, we plan to set up a greater number of kiosks in Tiruppur especially at the containment zones. We hope to set up more such kiosks in the coming days,” Vijayakarthikeyan said.

Chennai to get testing kiosks

Greater Chennai Corporation (GCC) has also planned to set up testing kiosks in Chennai by the end of this week and after the rapid test kits arrive. “We plan to set up testing kiosks across the city which would save a lot of time for both collection agents and patients. These kiosks will be set up in the next couple of days,” P Madhusudan Reddy, Joint Commissioner (Health), GCC, told DH.

Chennai has the maximum number of positive COVID-19 patients in Tamil Nadu at 149.