Some Media Portals Putting Out Fake Reports On COVID-19 Sero-Prevalence: Delhi Govt Tells Delhi HC

The said statement was made before the Division Bench of Justice Hima Kohli and Justice Subramonium Prasad, after the court pulled up the Delhi Government for leaking the said sero-surveillance reports to the media before producing the same before the court.

The court questioned the said trend by saying that:

'We know what has been happening. You tell us that the final report is not ready yet, and produce figures from an interim report, and the next day the said report is all over the media. Why are you doing this? We had said very categorically that such reports are first supposed to be produced before the court.'

Appearing for the Delhi Government, Mr Satyakam informed the court that the actual sero-prevalence in Delhi is 25%, while the media reports show it to be 33%. He said:

'Just after the hearing, I see HT and Indian Express running reports showing 33% sero-prevalence in Delhi. Some journalists called me asking for the report, but I told them that no such report has been released to the media.'

At this point, the court asked the government as to why it did not deny the veracity of such reports in public domain when it knew that they were fake. No response was received by the court on this query.

The court continued to pull up the Delhi Government for not carrying out RT-PCR test as per the full capacity. The court asked the government to explain as to why despite multiple orders, the government is not fully utilising the RT-PCR capacity, which is globally known as the golden test.