The federal government has directed all the provinces to commence Rapid Antigen Testing (RAT) for diagnosis of Covid-19.

It has also directed the provincial governments to procure World Health Organisation-approved RAT kits to start process with effect from Nov 15 stating that ‘the RAT has certain advantages over RT-PCR, such as relatively low cost and return results in approximately 15 minutes while the other test process takes a few days’.

The instructions were issued in the wake of the second wave of the infection with a purpose of disease mapping.

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