Samples Declared Inappropriate Before Testing

Bhopal, 8 June 2020:

A series of copies of communication between the Mahatma Gandhi Memorial Medical College, Indore, and its virology laboratory tasked with testing samples for COVID-19 has revealed that authorities directed the testing in-charge to declare clutches of samples “inappropriate”, without testing them or consulting virologists.

Declaring samples “inappropriate” warranted their recollection after disposal, a decision taken at the laboratory, explained an official of the State Directorate of Health Services. “You can’t declare them such before beginning the testing process,” she said.

‘No clue on orders’

“In this case, we were asked to deem them inappropriate even before putting them to test. We still have no clue why we got such orders from the top,” said an official, who worked at the laboratory, requesting anonymity.

Despite such directions, virologists put most of the samples asked to be declared “inappropriate” to test between April 3 and 20.

“Though we found few to be actually inappropriate, we were surprised to find most samples either tested positive or negative, which also suggests they were valid samples. Declaring them inappropriate would mean they never get recorded as tested,” he said.

‘Samples showed results’

For instance, on April 3 of at least three samples asked to be declared “inappropriate”, one had tested positive later. Similarly, in the list containing details of eight samples on April 7, another patient had tested positive. On April 4, as many as 34 samples were requested to be declared “inappropriate”, explained the official.

Screengrabs of conversations on WhatsApp, the social media platform virologists and college officials are using to coordinate work, reveal senior officials of the college forwarded a list every day in April at least to virologists to declare samples collected at three government-run facilities managed by the college as “inappropriate”.

In one such conversation on April 5 concerning Shatrughan Panjwani, the first medical doctor, a private practitioner, to die of COVID-19 in Indore four days later, an official overseeing the laboratory informs a senior official, after his first sample tested negative: “Sachin* (a virologist) is saying if we run the sample then we can’t give inappropriate sampling becos it is coming in machine record...we can give the report before processing.” (sic)

“We were being repeatedly nagged to declare results inappropriate,” said the official speaking anonymously. To the message, the senior official replied: “Ok. Do it before running.”, and when subsequently asked, “Chest ward say jo sample aa rahe he….inappropriate sampling?”, she replies - Yes.

Claiming that the official had edited WhatsApp messages, college Dean Jyoti Bindal told The Hindu, “We have never placed such requests with our laboratory. I am totally denying it. The machine has a memory, which is directly stored on the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) portal.”

Further, a professor of the college around mid-May wrote to the Madhya Pradesh Chief Secretary, the Principal Secretary, Medical Education, and Divisional Commissioner, Indore, alleging manipulation of results in the laboratory.

‘Allegation baseless’

Confirming the receipt of the email, Sanjay Kumar Shukla, the Principal Secretary, said, “We had expected a detailed report from the college on this. But prima facie, this is all untrue. Any kind of alleged manipulation is completely baseless. This is my clear impression about the issue.” The Hindu