Asymptomatic People Exposed To COVID Should Also Be Tested: WHO

Geneva: People exposed to the novel coronavirus should be tested even if they do not show immediate symptoms of infection. The World Health Organisation (WHO) repeated it advice on Thursday after the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said this week that people exposed to COVID-19 but not symptomatic may not need to be tested. Apart from surprising doctors, the CDC’s statement led to accusations that the guidance was politically motivated, reported Hindustan Times (HT) quoting Reuters.

Maria Van Kerkhove, a WHO epidemiologist, said the UN agency recommended suspected cases and their contacts be tested, if possible, but the focus should be on people displaying signs of infection, the report added.

“Our recommendations are to test suspect cases, and we have definitions for those. We have definitions of contacts, and who contacts are of confirmed cases, and make recommendations that contacts, if feasible, should be tested regardless of the development of symptoms,” Van Kerkhove told a news briefing, reported HT.

“The focus, though, is on those that do develop symptoms.”

Stating that there was a rationale for testing asymptomatic people, Mike Ryan, head of WHO’s emergencies programme said, “It absorbs huge amounts of resources. We need to focus on testing the right individuals, we need to focus on maximizing the testing in the clusters, and we need to focus on the quality of the testing, and the speed of the turnaround.”