Chief Minister, Shri Pinarayi Vijayan today announced that the Covid labs set up at the Pariyaram Government Medical College at Kannur and the Kottayam Medical College has got the approval from ICMR for Coronavirus testing. The lab at Kannur Medical College will start functioning from tomorrow.

The UV sterilised lab, spread over 2,200 sq. ft., is equipped with four real-time PCR machines. In the first phase, this lab will be able to do 15 tests per day which will be gradually increased to conduct 60 tests in the next phase.

“With the opening of these two new labs, tests to detect Covid-19 will be conducted in 14 government labs in Kerala. Apart from this, there are two private labs also in Kerala which are doing these tests. Since the number of Coronavirus cases was increasing in the State, the government had decided to procure ten real-time PCR machines to ramp up testing”, the CM added.