To enhance testing facilities for detecting infectious diseases such as Ebola in the country, the Union health ministry is planning to set up a modern state of the art dedicated lab of National Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) in Uttarakhand for the first time. The lab has been planned to set up in the state capital, Dehradun.

This comes at a time when there is a dire need for regular screening of migrant populations reaching India to detect possibilities of outbreak of viral infections such as Ebola and swine flu.

The state too lacks a dedicated testing lab for screening patients in a timely manner. As of today, samples collected are being sent to the National Centre of Disease Control (NCDC) based in Delhi.

According to official sources, the administration has been directed to allocate 2 acres of land for the same in 15 days time.

Experts have pinpointed that most of the existing healthcare institutions come out with reports which are clinically oriented and fail to cover the whole spectrum of diagnosis of viral and bacterial infections. There is a need for proper referrals between healthcare institutions and state of art labs in order to achieve desired results. There is an emerging trend of infections from animals like Ebola which will account for about 70 per cent of infections in future. These infections will attack both animals and humans if not diagnosed in a rapid and specific manner.

There is a need to develop vaccines for following viruses like human immunodeficiency virus, Ross river virus, Parvo virus B19, West Nile virus, BK virus, Sindbis virus, Nombre virus, Hanta virus, Junin virus, Semiliki Forest virus, Heartland virus, hepatitis C, Machupo virus, Crimean Congo Haemorrhagic fever virus, Ebstein barr virus, hepatitis D, Sabia virus, PRNP, Lass virus, Chikungunya virus, Rhino viruses, Marburg virus, dengue virus, Ebola Haemorrhagic virus, Middle East respiratory syncytial coroana virus.

Experts also suggest that there is a need for a three-tier approach to support referral centres across the country which can be developed at the central, state and district level to help diagnose the infections before its outbreak.