Aizawl, June 15 (PTI): As many as 8,884 people are currently under quarantine in Mizoram, state Health minister Dr. R Lalthangaliana said on Monday.
Most of them are quarantined at institutional facilities while others are lodged at community facilities, some are in home quarantine and some have put up in hotels.
The health minister on Monday visited several quarantine facilities set up by churches here.
Expressing apology to those inmates, who have completed their quarantine period but need to stay back at their respective quarantine facilities due to delay in getting sample results, Lalthanglaima said, the testing process could not be expedited because installation of automated RNA extractor machines was in progress.
He said that the government is currently running two Real-time Polymerase Chain Reaction (RT-PCR) machines, at Zoram Medical College (ZMC) to test samples for Covid-19.
Similar machines will soon arrive in the state and one of them will be installed at Lunglei to cater to the needs of people, he said.
"We hope that our testing ratio will increase once the new machines are installed," he said.
According to the International Atomic Energy Agency, the RT-PCR technique is highly sensitive and specific and can deliver a reliable diagnosis as fast as three hours, though usually laboratories take on average between six to eight hours.
The health minister also said that at least 116 coronavirus patients are currently undergoing treatment in different parts of the state.
Of the 116 patients, 43 are undergoing treatment at the ZMC, he said. All the 116 patients are in stable condition, he added.