Soni opens city’s first Covid-19 testing lab

Tribune News Service

Jalandhar, August 10

Ramping up the testing capacity of Covid-19 in the state, Punjab Medical Education and Research Minister OP Soni today inaugurated the district’s first government Covid-19 testing laboratory established on the premises of Regional Disease Diagnostic Laboratory North Zone, Ladowali Road, here.

Accompanied by the Vice-Chancellor, Baba Farid University of Health Science, Faridkot, Dr Raj Bahadur, Special Secretary (Animal Husbandry) Manpreet Singh Chhatwal, Deputy Commissioner Ghanshyam Thori, Commissioner of Police Gurpreet Singh Bhullar, the minister said the laboratory would carry out 1,000 tests per day. He said with the opening of four labs today, the testing capacity in Punjab will touch the mark of 16,000 tests daily, which would further lead to containing the spread of contagion by ensuring timely detection and treatment. The minister said a dedicated team of the experienced doctors and scientists had been stationed here besides providing requisite medical equipment, lab staff and others for the Covid testing by Baba Farid University of Health Sciences, Faridkot. Soni said with this facility starting here now there would be no need to send the samples to other places and would help the local health department for start testing, tracing and treatment at the earliest.

Prominent among present occasion included DCP Arun Saini, SDM-II Rahul Sindhu, Joint Director Dr HS Kahlon, Dr Gomty Mahajan, scientists Dr Mukesh Mittal, Dr Gagandeep Bangar, Dr Charanjit Sarangal, Dr Gaurav Sharma, Dr Deepak Bhatia and Dr Parveen Kumar and others.

156 +ve in Jalandhar

In Jalandhar, as many as 156 positive cases were reported on Monday, while only six positive cases emerged from Kapurthala. Nawanshahr had 14 new cases, including one pre-operative case and a cop.

29 new cases in Hoshiarpur

The district reported 29 positive cases on Monday, taking the total number of positive cases 673. Of the total cases, 94 are active cases. Civil Surgeon Jasveer Singh said out of 29 positive cases, eight were reported from Ransota village under the Mand-Pandher Health Centre, one from Ghogra, five from Chakkowal, two from Garhshankar, four from Hajipur, one from Mukerian, three from Dasuya, two from Tanda, one from Bhunga and two from Hoshiarpur (one from Nai Abadi and one from Bhim Nagar). OC

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