Health Minister Mandaviya reviews screening, Covid testing facility at Delhi airport

Amid a spike in coronavirus cases in some countries, the government has sounded an alert, tightened Covid guidelines and asked states and Union territories to prepare for any eventuality.

New Delhi, Jan 02: Union Health Minister Mansukh Mandaviya on Monday reviewed the screening and Covid testing facility at the Delhi Indira Gandhi International Airport in view of the recent spike in cases of COVID-19 in some countries.

Mandaviya reviewed the RT-PCR testing mechanism and the Air Suvidha portal which has been started from 1st January, 2023. He also visited the Airport Health Organization office (APHO) and interacted with the officials present there.

He stated that "passengers arriving from 6 high-risk countries are now mandatorily required to upload their negative RT-PCR test reports in the Air Suvidha portal within 72 hours of undertaking their journey to India while travellers from other countries are being randomly tested at the airports upon their arrival in India".

"This is being done to ensure that genome sequencing of any positive case is promptly done to understand the strength and behaviour of any new variants", he further stated.

Union Health Ministry has already issued the revised guidelines for international passengers travelling to India.

The government has made random Covid tests mandatory for two per cent of passengers arriving on each international flight irrespective of their port of departure. Besides, passengers arriving in India from China, Hong Kong, Japan, South Korea, Singapore and Thailand are being mandatorily required to provide Covid negative reports from January 1.

The test has to be conducted within 72 hours of undertaking the journey to India and the negative report from the RT-PCR test has to be uploaded on the Air Suvidha portal before departure.

"This arrangement is in practice with effect from 10 am on Sunday, January 1, 2023," the letter said. In a tweet on Monday, Mandaviya said, "Reviewed Air Suvidha system and RT-PCR testing facilities for international passengers at the IGI Airport, New Delhi."