Doctors in Narayanpet start facial thermal screening to detect COVID-19 suspects

Hyderabad: Narayanpet's first COVID-19 death was a 45-day-old baby. The district administration is still clueless about how the child got infected with the virus, as the district still continues to keep away from the coronavirus. Also the primary and secondary contacts of the baby have been tested negative.

To prevent the spread of COVI-019, authorities will conduct a facial thermal screening camp in Abhangapur village in rural Narayanpet where the baby was from. Every individual in the village will be scanned for any nascent signs of fever.

The state-of-the-art next-generation thermal image acquisition camera from Japan will be used to process facial analysis (fever test solution). According to the Narayanpet administration, this technology is advanced and accurate when compared to the digital infrared cameras being presently used to check for fever symptoms. It measures body temperature from a distance of three feet thereby ensuring the doctors are also protected.

Narayanpet Collector Hari Chandana said, “This is an advanced version of PreScreening. Based on these results subsequent detailed COVID-19 tests can be conducted. This avoids excess sample collections and overburdening of laboratories. Samples can be collected only on the basis of the symptoms recorded."

This procedure will detect potential patients with COVID-19 symptoms by analysing the difference(s) in facial temperatures (fever) through thermal patterns acquired during the screening.