Navi Mumbai: Doctor suspended over 'fake' COVID-19 negative reports

Photo for representational purpose

The municipal commissioner of Navi Mumbai has suspended Dr Sachin Nemane, who was in charge of antigen testing at the municipal corporation's testing centre, after receiving complaints of fake COVID-19 reports from the centre being published on the website of the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR).

As per a report in Mumbai Mirror, the Navi Mumbai Municipal Corporation (NMMC) has also formed a team to investigate the allegations, and whether this is part of a larger scam in COVID-19 testing centres. Social activists have alleged that the names of people are listed as having tested negative - despite not having undergone tests - on the ICMR website , and that at least 10,000 such fake reports from Navi Mumbai have been published on the site.

Also Read: Mumbai: BMC to provide free masks, charge Rs 200 fine from COVID-19 rules violators

This, activists say, is happening with the people who have undergone undergone test and found negative but their family members are not but their names are listed on the website. They claim one of the people listed on the website as having tested negative is actually a person who died 10 years ago.

Activists alleged that this was being done so that the NMMC could inflate the testing numbers, and claimed that it was happening in Thane and Palghar too.

Also Read: COVID-19: Mumbai records 19K tests in single day

Ankush Kadam, core committee member of Maratha Kranti Morcha, said it was he who alerted the authorities of a possible scam. He said that during their coronavirus awareness campaign some of his colleagues met a few former COVID-19 patients who had been surprised to find the names of their relatives on the website.

"We decided to see for ourselves so we sent a few of our activists for testing. When the NMMC staffers asked them to give details of their family members, they did so. Among the names they gave were those of relatives who had died years ago. As the activists tested negative, their families weren't called in for testing. But a few days later we saw the names of all the relatives they named on the ICMR website as COVID-19 negative, including those of relatives who had died 10 years ago," he said.

Kadam claimed the practice was rampant in other places too. "Thousands of names have been put on the website of people who hadn't been tested," he said. "The government is spending crores of rupees on testing. If such irregularities are happening at Covid testing centres, then it is the government as well as the citizens who are being cheated," he added.

After the allegations came to light, leader of the opposition in the legislative council Pravin Darekar from the BJP met NMMC chief Abhijit Bangar and demanded an inquiry into the allegations and action against the guilty. Health Minister Rajesh tope said on Friday that strict action would be taken if the allegations were found to be true. By Friday evening, Bangar had formed a special investigation team and suspended Dr Nemane for the duration of the inquiry.

NMMC commissioner Bangar aid, "Prima facia we have not found any malafide intention. However it is clear that there was negligence on the part of the data entry operator. Since Dr Nemane was in charge of the testing centre, action has been taken against him. There are false entries (on the ICMR website) from a few centres and we are conducting the inquiry to ascertain the number of such entries. The report will be ready in two weeks."

He added, "So far around 3.5 lakh people have been tested in Navi Mumbai and prima facie it doesn't look like the number of false entries is more than 2 per cent to 3 per cent of that. Nonetheless, we cannot make such mistakes."

Assistant municipal commissioner Sanjay Kakade of the NMMC claimed that they had not found any discrepancies in the testing kits and said it could have been a data entry error. Another NMMC officer, who did not wish to be named, said, "It looks like those who were entering the data included the names of people who did not undergo testing. We are conducting a detailed investigation to understand why and how the names were published online and whether there was any malafide intention."

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