NEW DELHI : The Union Health Secretary Rajesh Bhushan has directed states/UTs to do surveillance of incoming international travellers as a part of revised surveillance strategy in context of covid-19.
Under the revised surveillance plan, Bhushan has directed states have to follow three-pronged genomics survillance strategy. “All international travelers arriving in India testing positive for COVID-19 shall be sequence.
This will include random screening of 2% of passengers in each incoming flight into India by RT-PCR and all positive specimens to be sent for genomic sequencing.
Passengers who test positive need to be advised isolation and clinically managed as per prevailing guidelines." The union health secretary further said the states have to identify and establish suitable linkage between sentinel sites and INSACOG network laboratories to send samples for genonme secqueing. “Positive samples from large clusters and outbreak in the community and unusual events should also be sent for whole genome sequencing," he said.