The Indian government has announced that  RT-PCR testing will be mandatory at airports for international arrivals coming from China, Hong Kong, Japan, South Korea, Singapore, and Thailand from January 1. The move has been made to prevent the spread of Covid virus in India. It is to be noted that the government has been mulling over making testing mandatory for a while, considering the spike in Covid cases in the aforementioned countries. Union Health Minister Dr Mansukh Mandaviya informed about the same through a tweet via his official account.


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Along with this Dr Mansukh Mandaviya also announced that the filling of the Air Suvidha forms will be mandatory for international arrivals. In his tweet, Union Health Minister said, "RTPCR test has been made mandatory for passengers coming from China, Hong Kong, Japan, South Korea, Singapore, and Thailand from 1 January 2023. They will have to upload their report on the Air Suvidha portal before travel."


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Previously, the government had ordered 2 percent of total international arrivals to be tested at airports. However, the scope of the test has not been expanded to all the passengers considering the increasing number of cases. Out of the 6,000 travellers that were tested for COVID-19 upon arrival in the last two days, at least 39 were determined to be positive.



Recently, high-level discussions were held between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Health Minister Mandaviya to assess the nation's preparedness to handle a potential spike in cases. On Tuesday, simulation exercises were conducted in all the states and union territories to assess the operational capability of the healthcare infrastructure to handle any spike in COVID-19 infection.