Govt says PCR tests to continue despite antigen rapid tests being imported

The Health Ministry yesterday said that PCR tests for COVID-19 would continue on the identified and vulnerable communities across the country despite the import of antigen rapid test kits to Sri Lanka.

Health Ministry Secretary Major General Dr. Sanjeewa Munasinghe said that PCR testing had been found to be the best option as this could detect if the virus load in an individual was high or low. Antigen tests could detect the virus only if there was a high virus load in a patient's body.

Since there was a major outbreak of COVID-19 in recent weeks, across Sri Lanka, the Health Ministry had requested the World Health Organization for antigen test kits to step up testing on identified communities. 
However since there was a delay, tenders were called for from local companies and around 28 companies had made submissions.

Dr. Munasinghe said that the submissions that met the requirements and had been put forward to the technical committee. He denied reports that the government had bypassed the tender process and picked a private company to purchase antigen test kits.

“The tender process has been followed. No one has been picked as yet as the samples from these companies are still being validated,” he said.

The WHO, has meanwhile purchased 100,000 antigen test kits from India and will gift it to Sri Lanka today.  (JAMILA HUSAIN)