COVID-19 testing: 14 centres of excellence to mentor medical colleges

Seeking to expeditiously expand COVID-19 testing facilities, the government hasidentified 14 Centres of Excellence such asPGIMER in Chandigarh, AIIMS, New DelhiandNIMHANS in Bangalore to mentorall government and private medical colleges in their catchment areas to create state-of-art molecular virology setups.

In the wake of spurt in cases of coronavirus in India, the ICMR has taken into account the need to expeditiously expand COVID-19 testing facilities in all parts of the country and has initiated a proactive search of potential laboratories which could be enabled for coronavirus testing, a senior official said.

The ICMR has already invited applications from all government and private medical colleges for establishing COVID-19 testing facilities.

"As per directives of Union Ministers of Home and Health, under a core team of Director, AIIMS, Delhi and Director and Director General of ICMR, a total of 14 Centres of Excellence have been designated. These Centres have been delegated a responsibility of mentoring all government and private medical colleges in their catchment area and eventually create state-of-art molecular virology setups," the ICMR said.

In a letter to directors of the 14 designated institutes, ICMR Director General Dr Balram Bhargava said, "This work will involve significant due diligence, interaction with various medical colleges, training and handholding. Therefore, it has been decided to distribute the responsibility evenly across various institutions of eminence all across the country.These institutions are expected to serve as mentors of the medical college in their allotted area and facilitate the establishment of COVID-19 testing facilities in respective states."