Thiruvananthapuram: Kerala Chief Minister, Shri Pinarayi Vijayan today issued a stern warning that the government will be forced to take legal action against private laboratories in the State who do not pass on the benefits of the revised RTPCR testing rate to the customers. It may be recalled that the State government had on April 29 slashed the rate of the RTPCR test used to detect Coronavirus infection from Rs.1,700 to Rs.500.
Briefing the media, Chief Minister said, “We understand that some private labs are refusing to conduct RTPCR tests after their rates were reduced. The government expects the private labs to cooperate with the government’s decision and adhere to the revised rates. The revised tariff of Rs.500 is inclusive of the manpower cost for conducting the test and the price of materials/equipment used for the test which comes to Rs.240. These rates were decided after a detailed study. It has also been noticed that some labs are encouraging their customers to opt for the costly TrueNat test. The government will not accept such this at a time when the disease spread is on the rise. We will be forced to take legal action against those labs that refuse to do the tests or insist on billing the old rate. We expect them to do the test at the rate fixed by the government.”
The Chief Minister also extended his May Day greetings to all the healthcare workers who have dedicated themselves to Covid prevention and are at the forefront in the fight against this pandemic for more than a year now without a break.
Meanwhile, 35,636 new Covid cases were confirmed in Kerala today from 1,46,474 sample tests with a Test Positivity Rate of 24.33%. Two districts, Kozhikode and Ernakulam, have reported over 5,000 new positive cases. The total number of patients under treatment in the state is now 3,23,828 even as 15,493 patients were cured of the infection during the last one day. 48 deaths were confirmed as caused by the disease taking the related death toll in the State to 5,356.
The CM reiterated that those waiting for the second dose of the vaccine will be given priority over those who have registered for the first dose.” However, the vaccination for those over 18 years of age may be delayed by a few days. The process of purchasing the vaccine from the vaccine manufacturers is in progress. We had decided to vaccinate all the people above 45 years of age by May 30 but it will not be possible as we have not yet received the required vaccine stock. Therefore, immediate steps need to be taken by the Central Government to make more vaccines available.”
The Chief Minister also informed that 150 private hospitals (up from 106 a week ago) are now part of the Karunya Aarogya Suraksha Scheme (KASP). Efforts are also being made to add more private hospitals as part of this scheme. This would enable the government to bear the medical expenses of more Covid patients seeking treatment in private hospitals. They have been asked to reserve 50% of their beds for Covid treatment.