NEPALGUNJ, April 18: A medical team has arrived at the Bheri hospital to make necessary arrangement to being COVID-19 testing. The team that arrived on Friday has begun a discussion with the hospital microbiologists and laboratory technicians about the protocol and procedures for swab testing.

Swab testing will begin only after the visiting team led by a technical expert on Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR) testing Sulav Acharya gives a green signal, said Chief of the Hospital, Dr. Prakash Bahadur Thapa. The team is inspecting the laboratory, testing equipment and training the microbiologists at the hospital.

"We will do a trial test of swab this evening and if everything goes well we will begin regular testing from Sunday morning," Dr. Thapa said. The PCR testing machine had been installed at the Bheri hospital a week ago but its operation has been delayed for lack of experts and necessary kits.

So far, samples of 483 persons were tested using the Rapid Diagnostic Test (RDT) and PCR in Banke but all have given negative results, said the Health Office, Banke focal person Naresh Shrestha.

 
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