Zoom News : Jan 23, 2021, 07:19 PM
New Delhi: The Directorate General of Health Services (DGHS) has issued a show cause notice to the chief district medical officer of the West district after officials were unable to trace 200 samples collected for the fifth round of the serological survey in Delhi.In the notice issued by the DGHS, Dr Nutan Mundeja, officials have been asked to explain the reason behind the lapse within three days. “This is a serious lapse on the part of team of West district responsible for sero survey,” stated the notice, also marked to Principal Secretary, Health and Family Welfare, Delhi government.The fifth round of the serological survey kicked off in Delhi on January 11. A total of 28,000 samples have been collected during the exercise which was expected to end on Friday. The West district had a target of collecting 4200 samples for the survey.The last sero survey was conducted in October.“This is the first time that the samples from any district have been misplaced. The whole purpose of the exercise is defeated if the officials will have to re-collect the samples. It seems that the samples got lost between the lab team and the district officials,” said a senior official from the state health department.A serological survey is an exercise to check the prevalence of the disease in a population, by detecting the presence of specific antibodies against the virus.Meanwhile, Delhi saw 266 new cases and seven deaths due to Covid-19 in the last 24 hours, taking the total number of cases in the city to 63,352.