Odisha Pips Delhi To Become Number 2 In COVID-19 Testing

Bhubaneswar: Odisha has emerged second among states in the country by conducting 1,265 tests per million per day, compared to the national average of 580.

Only Goa is doing more tests than Odisha, the Ministry of Health tweeted on Friday with a statistical bar-chart of states and Union Territories performing more than 140 COVID tests per day per million population.

Taking to his official Twitter handle, Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik wrote: “Odisha has been consistently ramping up tests for identification and treatment of COVID-19 positive cases.”

Thursday saw a record 56,479 samples being tested for COVID-19 while 53,478 tests were carried out on Wednesday.

The data for the other four days with over 50,000 tests.

Also Read: COVID-19 Tests: Odisha High On Numbers, Low On Result Accuracy!

States like Madhya Pradesh at 244 daily tests per million population, Rajasthan at 309, West Bengal at 365, Bihar at 408, Kerala at 534, Punjab at 546 and Maharashtra at 579, are far behind not only Odisha but also the national average.

Even developed states like Delhi, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh and Gujarat are testing fewer samples than Odisha.

“Aggressive testing will lead to early identification and isolation of COVID19 positive cases and this coupled with efficient clinical treatment, will keep the fatality rate down,” government sources said. 

Odisha has so far reported 72718 COVID-19 positive cases and 390 deaths due to the infection. A total of 48577 patients have already been cured.