Coronavirus tests to begin at Civil Hospital Karachi soon, JPMC short of funds

KARACHI: Sindh's largest public medical facility, the Dr Ruth K. M. Pfau Civil Hospital, would start coronavirus testing next week as it set to acquire kits from the National Institute of Health (NIH), Islamabad, in a couple of days, officials said Sunday.

"One of our leading pathologists has completed training on testing COVID-19 from NIH, Islamabad and now we are awaiting kits from them to start testing coronavirus at CHK lab in Karachi", an official of Sindh health department told Geo News on Sunday.

At present, no public sector hospital in Sindh offers coronavirus testing except the Ojha campus of the Dow University of Health Sciences (DUHS), which is a semi-private facility. The other two, Indus Hospital Karachi and Aga Khan University Hospital (AKUH), are both private health facilities, with the latter charging at least Rs7,900.

Related: You can get checked for coronavirus at these hospitals and labs in Karachi

The health department official said the NIH has dispatched coronavirus kits to the Dr Ruth K. M. Pfau Civil Hospital, which would start testing as soon as they are received.

Four to six suspected coronavirus patients arrived at the Dr Ruth K. M. Pfau Civil Hospital daily, the official added, noting that their samples had to be sent to either to AKUH or DUHS for analysis.

Viral Transport Media shortage

However, the official underlined that coronavirus testing was not necessary for every patient with flu-like symptoms but that only those who returned from abroad — or the people who came into contact with them and had symptoms such as cough and breathing difficulty — should go for coronavirus testing.

It is noteworthy that at the moment, multiple public and private hospitals in Karachi face a shortage of Viral Transport Media (VTM) — which is used to transport nasal swab samples from medical facilities to coronavirus-testing laboratories — as a large number of people were getting tested for coronavirus.

Pakistan's coronavirus tally rises to 53

On the other hand, officials at Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Centre (JPMC) said they required at least Rs20-25 million to start coronavirus testing at a separate laboratory to be established alongside their isolation ward.

As of reporting time, the number of confirmed COVID-19 cases in Pakistan has risen to 53 after 20 more cases were reported in the country. Punjab confirmed its first case today, while Sindh had 18 new cases — 13 from Sukkur and five from Karachi.

One case was reported from Islamabad, while Balochistan has at least 10 and Gilgit-Baltistan three. Seven people were kept under quarantine in Taftan.

Khyber Pakhtunkhwa was yet to report a case.

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