The Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) on Friday announced that rapid antigen testing kits have now reached Leh after setting up a lab for RT-PCR testing. “@ICMRDELHI has reached a major milestone for enhancing testing in Ladakh! After setting up a lab for RT-PCR testing, rapid antigen testing kits have now reached Leh!” tweeted the ICMR. The ICMR said the total number of samples tested till July 2 was 9,297,749 of which 241,576 samples were tested on Thursday itself. India reported the highest ever single-day spike of 20,903 COVID-19 cases in 24 hours on Friday, said the Union Ministry of Health and Family Welfare. With these new cases, India’s coronavirus tally has risen to 625,544 cases of which 227,439 patients are active cases while 379,892 patients have been cured/discharged/migrated. Around 379 more deaths due to COVID-19 were reported in the country in the last 24 hours, taking the number of deaths due to the infection to 18,213.
