ICMR initiates community-based serosurvey in 69 districts
The survey collection already started in two districts of the Uttar Pradesh and one district in Assam
To estimate the prevalence COVID-19 infection in the Indian population, the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR), in collaboration with the Department of Health and Family Welfare, Government of India and National Centre for Disease Control with support from the State health departments and key stakeholders including WHO, India have initiated a community-based serosurvey in 69 selected districts of 21 states and Union Territories. The survey is coordinated by the ICMR’s National Institute of Epidemiology (NIE) and National Institute of Research in Tuberculosis (NIRT), Chennai.
Andhra Pradesh, Assam, Maharashtra, Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh, Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, West Bengal, Jharkhand, Karnataka, Odisha, Punjab, Haryana, Tamil Nadu, Telangana, Jammu and Kashmir, Uttarakhand and Bihar are some of the states where the survey would be conducted.
As part of the study, people from Red, Orange and Green zones in a district will be tested for COVID-19 at random to check if they have developed antibodies against the infection even though they are asymptomatic or show mild symptoms. The survey will involve the collection of venous blood samples from 400 randomly selected individuals (one per household) from 10 clusters in each district. Sera from these individuals will be tested for the presence of IgG antibodies using ELISA test developed by ICMR-National Institute of Virology (NIV), Pune. The results of the survey will provide information about the spread of SARS-CoV-2 infection in different parts of the country.
The survey will be conducted at 10 health facilities (six public and four private) and would test outpatient attendees and pregnant women among the low-risk group, and healthcare workers among the high-risk population.
Dr Manoj Murhekar, Director ICMR-National Institute of Epidemiology (NIE), Chennai said, ” The objective of district-level based surveillance for COVID-19 is to monitor the trend in the prevalence of COVID-19 infection at the district level. We are aiming to finish the survey in two weeks time and the survey will collect a sample of 25000 adults from low risk to high-risk category. The survey collection already started in two districts of the Uttar Pradesh and one district in Assam.’
At least 100 samples of healthcare workers from selected districts per week and 400 per month would be tested. Besides, 50 samples each of the outpatient attendees and pregnant women per week and 200 samples per month would be collected, the document stated. Throat and nasal swabs will be collected for RT-PCR tests and samples should be tested in a one-time pool of 25.
Besides this community-based survey, the Ministry of Health is also initiating hospital-based surveillance to monitor the trend of infection in all districts.
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