Newslaundry Podcast

In this episode of NL Hafta, Abhinandan Sekhri, Manisha Pande and Mehraj D Lone of Newslaundry are joined by Suhasini Haider, diplomatic editor of the Hindu newspaper, and Dr Arjun Dang, CEO of Dr Dang’s Labs.Starting off with a discussion on the coronavirus pandemic, Abhinandan wonders why India’s approach to containing it differs from that prescribed by the WHO, and what impact this will have. To Abhinandan’s question about the government not allowing healthcare professionals to use existing kits to test for coronavirus, Dang explains that this is to ensure uniformity in and quality of testing. All testing kits for coronavirus must be approved by the National Institute of Virology, Pune. “If the testing isn’t done in a controlled and regulated manner, we will actually go from the frying pan into the fire”. To Mehraj’s question about India’s testing capacity, Dang points out that the pandemic has disrupted the supply chains of the kits manufactured in Europe and China. India now faces an uphill battle to get