1st Odisha COVID-19 Sero Survey Begins; Focus On Children To Check Exposure

Bhubaneswar: The ICMR-Regional Medical Research Centre (RMRC) here on Monday began state-level serological surveillance to estimate and compare the age-specific prevalence of COVID-19 antibodies in people and healthcare workers.

The survey will continue till September 20.

It is the first state-level sero survey after the vaccination drive expansion and will include children below 18 years of age. “As decisions on the opening of educational institutions and targeting the last mile in immunization need to be made in near future, it is crucial to generate evidence on exposure of children and adolescents, the unvaccinated group, to the pandemic and assesses the persistence of immunity among the vaccinated group, particularly the healthcare workers. Vaccination coverage against COVID-19 among general population and healthcare workers will also be estimated through this survey,” said RMRC in an official statement.

A total of 40 samples from the community (randomly) and 100 from the healthcare workers (purposively) will be collected from 137 clusters distributed over the 12 districts – Khurda, Puri, Jajpur, Mayurbhanj and Balasore from central zone, Sambalpur, Jharsuguda, Keonjhar, and Sundargarh from northern zone and Kandhamal, Kalahandi and Nabarangpur from southern regions.

Altogether 6,680 samples (1,200 from healthcare workers and 5,480 from the community) will be collected. Of the 5,480 targeted samples, 1644 will be collected from children aged between 6 and 17 years and 3836 from adults.

Six teams have been deployed to carry out the survey simultaneously in each zone of the state. The samples will be transported maintaining the proper cold chain and processed for estimation of antibody against SARS-CoV-2 at the Cobas Laboratory of RMRC.

FIVE NODAL OFFICERS FOR BHUBANESWAR

The COVID-19 serosurvey in Odisha capital will be conducted on August 31 and September 1.

The Bhubaneswar Municipal Corporation (BMC) has directed five nodal officers to mobilise at least 200 people in various age groups, including children, for the survey in ward 8, 15, 32, 41 and 63.