Physicians and officials of private hospitals have pleaded for their institutions to be given permission to conduct Covid-19 tests.
Neglecting the private sector in the fight against Covid-19 is not a wise decision, and some Covid-19 patients are going to private hospitals seeking treatment there anyway, the physicians said.
The plea comes in light of the rise in the number of confirmed cases of Covid-19 in the country even as the government ramps up testing efforts. As many as 182 new cases were confirmed from among 1,570 samples tested yesterday.
The government is currently testing for Covid-19 at 17 laboratories in the country - nine in Dhaka and eight in different districts. Testing facilities need to be expanded to the upazila level in order to come by a clear picture of the Covid-19 situation in the country, experts have said.
India and Pakistan have already brought private hospitals into their national response plans in anticipation of the threat of community transmission, while Bangladesh is lagging behind, they added.
The government should allow a fixed number of private hospitals that have the capacity to conduct rapid tests, according to the Bangladesh Private Medical College Association (BPMCA).
“Rapid testing is the only thing that the world is doing now to minimize the impact of the coronavirus. To do so, the government should allow private hospitals to introduce testing facilities, first to accelerate the detection of Covid-19 patients, and second, to separate infected people from those who are not in order to minimize risks of transmission,” said Dr AM Shamim, managing director of Labaid Group.
“Look, fever as a symptom is quite common for many diseases; kidney disease, cancer, any kind of disease is both complicated and simple. It is impossible to separate Covid-19 patients only by measuring their temperature. Rapid tests can identify 90% of Covid-19 patients and people should be tested at private hospitals in addition to government labs, as manpower and other modern facilities are already available at private institutions,” he added.
“Once identified via rapid tests, we can send Covid-19 infected patients to government hospitals and keep the non-Covid-19 patients at the private hospitals,” the Labaid MD further said.
He claimed a large number of private hospital staff members would not have had to go into isolation if the private hospitals had testing facilities.
What is needed to begin testing at private hospitals?
All necessary facilities are already available at private hospitals right now, with the exception of testing kits, said hospital operators.
“After providing kits, the government can fix a testing fee and a price on which we can buy kits from the government. The private sector needs to be brought in to reduce the spread of Covid-19,” said Dr Shamim.
The installation of PCR machines, which are needed for testing, is time-consuming so the government should provide rapid testing kits, he added.
BPMCA President Mubin Khan said testing facilities in the private sector are a must to save normal patients and healthcare staff, as many suspected Covid-19 patients are visiting private hospitals for treatment.
“We need to do more and more tests and this cannot be done by the government alone. Following testing, we have to quarantine suspects and put confirmed patients into isolation to minimize the possible danger ahead,” he said, adding that it would be difficult to ramp up testing further without bringing in the private sector.
Breaking out in China’s Wuhan in December last year, Covid-19 – a severe acute respiratory illness caused by a new strain of coronavirus named Sars-CoV-2 – has quickly spread throughout the world, becoming a pandemic in less than three months.
The health authorities in Bangladesh reported the first Covid-19 cases on March 8. As of yesterday, 803 people had tested positive for the extremely contagious disease in the country, including 39 who have died.
