Pune: People Miss Flights As They Are Unable To Get Mandatory RT-PCR COVID Test Reports On-Time, Labs Say Overburdened With Demand

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Sumit Singh

Pune, 14 April 2021: Pune district has been immensely affected by the COVID-19 pandemic, and citizens are daily facing several challenges due to regulations imposed by the government to curb the outbreak.

The government has now made the RT-PCR test to detect COVID-19 compulsory for travelers, employees, housemaids, and others. Many private laboratories in the district are not giving the reports on time citing various reasons like the unavailability of testing kits and surge in demand. Few private labs have also pending COVID-19 test reports from the last five days.

Many Pune residents, who had gone for COVID-19 testing to these labs, have taken to Twitter to vent out regarding the unavailability of COVID-19 testing kits at private labs which has halted the testing process. Many said that they have already undergone the swab tests at the labs and are still awaiting their test results from the last five days.

“A negative RT-PCR report (not older than 72 hours before departure) is now mandatory. 14-day quarantine for passengers arriving without a negative report,” IndiGo tweeted.

Ajoy Singh shared his experience regarding the RT-PCR test and his ticket. “The government is issuing these guidelines to make our life more complicated and the local authorities won’t be able to manage all this. I had booked an airplane ticket to Kolkata but had to cancel it as a negative RT-PCR report is mandatory to go to Kolkata and I was unable to get the report within the last three days,” Singh said.

According to data shared by the Pune airport, around 3,000 to 4,000 people travel to Pune every day and approximately the number is the same for departure. Around 45 flights have been operating on Wednesday.

As per the latest rule, a negative RT-PCR report is mandatory from passengers arriving in New Delhi from Maharashtra. The test report should not be older than 72 hours before departure. Flyers not carrying a negative RT-PCR report will have to undergo a 14-day quarantine. Airline companies IndiGo and SpiceJet also tweeted about these latest traveling regulations to alert passengers.

Meanwhile, Patna airport has tweeted on Wednesday that 10-day home quarantine is compulsory for passengers with a negative RT-PCR report taken within 72 hours.

Travel via Railways

We also reached out to PRO Pune Division Manoj Jhavar to know about the regulations for traveling via trains and regarding the RT-PCR testing issue. “We are making travelers aware about carrying negative RT-PCR reports and COVID-19 regulations and rules that need to be followed while traveling through messages and also flashing the information on television screens. However, we are only creating awareness, we are not taking any action on anyone and not even checking the test reports. It is the municipal corporations’ duty to do so. The civic officials are also present at the stations.”

What do the labs say?

We tried to contact many private laboratories to know the exact reason for this mess, but most of them were not ready to talk about the shortage of testing kits. The spokesperson of Krsnaa Diagnostic Center said, “We have no shortage of testing kits but the number of patients coming for testing is very high.”

One of the senior members of the Indian Medical Association (IMA) told Punekarnews.in that the government should not make RT-PCR tests mandatory for everyone. Instead, they should focus on contact testing. “They can suggest RT-PCR tests to symptomatic patients. Why make it compulsory for everyone when the local authorities cannot do it? Making RT-PCR tests mandatory has created chaos in public as well as private labs that are not able to manage such a large volume of citizens coming for testing,” he said.

We tried to contact the Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) commissioner Vikram Kumar inquiring on the issue as many citizens are suffering due to the mismanagement of labs. However, the commissioner, as usual, did not reply as it is a matter related to the public.

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