Abdul Khaliq Qureshi
Abbottabad
The manual PCR Machines has been provided by Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government to Ayub Medical Teaching Institution (AMTI) for Covid-19 tests, whereas the automatic machine has reportedly shifted to Chief Minister’s constituency in Swat. Highly placed sources in the health department told that PCR machine installed in Ayub Teaching hospital Abbottabad is a manual of nature which technically caused exposure of health staff posted in the laboratory.
The much-publicized automatic PCR machine provided by NDMA was shifted to Swat, the home district of Chief Minister Mahmood Khan whereas on severe public criticism, provincial the government managed to provide a manual PCR machine in Abbottabad. Sources further told that automatic PCR can save the health care professionals working in the laboratory contrary to the manual PCR machines where staff on duty were exposed at the stage of extraction manually, wash & mix process manually before reading by PCR.
In complete automatic PCR machines, all these three stages are done by the machine in the closed chamber.
According to Medical Director Dr. Ahsan Aurangezeb, at present, they were not having auto extractor along with a PCR machine, therefore they have been extracting manually.
