India has exponentially scaled up its capacity to conduct tests for the coronavirus disease (Covid-19) from one in January to more than 77 million in October, the Union ministry of health and family welfare said on Sunday.
The government credited the high level of testing in the country to a sustained low Covid-19 fatality rate (CFR). “Very high levels of TESTING lead to early identification, prompt isolation & effective treatment of #COVID19 cases. These have eventually resulted in a sustained low Fatality Rate,” the health ministry wrote on Twitter.
In a graph posted alongside the tweet that showed figures for the past 11 days, the ministry pointed towards a marginally declining trend of Covid-19 cases as the testing rate witnessed a spike. The nation’s CFR stands at 1.56%, according to the health ministry.
As of Saturday, as many as 7,89,92,534 tests had been conducted in the country with a jump of 11,42,131 tests done in a single day, according to the Indian Council of Medical Research’s (ICMR’s) data.
The first Covid-19 swab sample in India was tested on January 23 at ICMR’s National Institute of Virology (NIV) in Pune. India had one NIV laboratory in January and since then, the country has added 1,751 laboratories to its network to conduct Covid-19 tests, including 1,059 and 692 in the government and private sector, respectively.
A total of 6,473,544 confirmed cases of the viral infection have been reported in India while the death toll from the disease has surpassed 100,000, according to the health ministry.