Karnal's KCGMC to get machine to detect new Covid strains

Parveen Arora

Tribune News Service

Karnal, April 16

The Kalpana Chawla Government Medical College (KCGMC) will have soon the facility to detect new strains of Covid as the state government has given its nod to the college authorities to purchase a genome sequencing machine through Haryana Medical Services Corporation Limited (HMSCL).

Currently, samples with travel history from abroad and close contacts are sent to the National Centre for Disease Control (NCDC), Delhi, but after the installation of this machine, there would be no need to send samples there.

As per the authorities, the new initiative would save time as the reports would come speedily. The estimated cost of the machine is around Rs 3 crore. “The Additional Chief Secretary (ACS), Medical Education, has given nod for the purchase of genome sequencing machine, so that the determination of new strains of Covid can be done at the college level, saving energy and time,” said Dr Jagdish Dureja, Director, KCGMC.

He said that the process of procurement would be done by the HMSCL. Later, this machine could be used to detect any kind of cancer at the early stage. Besides, the machine could also be used for DNA sampling.

Earlier, a couple of samples have been detected with UK strains in the district, he said. The KCGMC has been analysing around 2,000 Covid samples daily and, on an average, around 15 per cent samples have been detected positive daily in the past five days. The KCGMC has two machines to analyse Covid samples. Of these, one is working and the other is being repaired.