Prof. William Ampofo, Head of Virology at the Noguchi Memorial Institute for Medical Research says that the country has tested an additional 30,000 samples since President Akufo-Addo’s last address on Sunday.
This means that Ghana has so far tested about 98,500 COVID 19 samples.
He says that a method being used by laboratories involved in Ghana’s testing of COVID 19 samples are using an efficient method that has helped them enhanced their testing capacities.
“Since the President addressed us on Sunday, we have actually tested close to 30,000 samples again using the same method because each time we do 10,000 samples, it’s actually a multiplication of a simple initial number”, he disclosed at the press briefing on Wednesday.
He further explained that “when this samples arrive at the lab, we go through a process to enable us utilize the reagents in a very efficient manner. We simply poll the samples. What this means is, if you have 1,000 samples, you put them in polls of ten and therefore, you test them at a time. So in a short time, instead of testing 1,000 samples, you actually test 10,000 samples,”
He noted that checks are done to ensure the samples are not diluted as the polling method is being used to enhance the number of sample tests.
“To ensure that we are actually not diluting the samples when we mix 10 of them together, we simply put one positive sample which was at the limit of detection of our system and diluted it with nine other samples which were negative. Therefore, we would determine that if we put ten together, we are still able to detect the first sample which is at the limit of the positive detection,” he clarified
Wednesday morning’s update on the COVID19 situation in the country from the Ghana Health Service indicates an increase in Ghana’s case count as well as in recoveries.
Ghana has now 1,152 positive cases of the virus with 120 recoveries and 9 deaths.