By Our Correspondent
JORHAT/ASSAM: CSIR-North East Institute of Science and Technology, Jorhat started Serological testingfor Antibody for SARS-COV-2 for the first time in this part of the country. Theactivities have been taken up initially for the staff and their family members of the institute aged 18 years and above who had voluntarily participated in this study. The collection of blood samples and related health data has been started with the 450 employees along with their family members to check for presence of COVID-19 antibodies from 25 August, 2020.
The study has also involves the use of well-designed detailed questionnaires to capture the demographic, lifestyle, and clinical history including current drug-usage history. This has been coupled with measurement of heart rate, blood pressure, etc. and anthropometric measurements including height weight, hip circumference, and waist circumference. Under the project, the institute will likely to track an array-vitals and genes.
In a subset of 5 to 10% of the total participants, it is proposed to carry out comprehensive analysis including, untargeted proteomics and metabolomics. In addition, telomerase activity and immunophenotyping will be done in these samples. These individuals have been chosen based on several criteria including their family history, biochemical risk status etc.
Dr G. Narahari Sastry, Director, CSIR-NEIST informed that the aim the project is to build a medical cohort to give long-term perspective on the malaises that affect Indians and determine, if such a databank can used to help with predicting, say, the onset of diabetes or cardiovascular diseases.
A long term cohort can be invaluable in answering several public health questions and many of the employees are expected to be continued for long time and so can be reliably followed and monitored. Dr Jatin Kalita, Principal Scientist of CSIR-North East Institute of Science and
Technology, Jorhat and Nodal Scientist of the Project said that the Serologic testing to detect IgG class antibodies against SARS-CoV-2 will play an essential role in determining the true prevalence of this virus. Serological assays aid in understanding the immune responses to SARS-CoV-2 in a dynamic qualitative or quantitative manner and to identify individuals who were infected compared to those who were not.
Considering the importance of the study, besides, the CSIR-NEIST employee and their family members, the testing of antibodies for SARS-COV-2 has also been extended to the people of nearby villages of the institute who voluntarily want to test Antibody. In the first phase about 650 nos. of samples have been collected and sample collection will be continued up to 31 August, 2020. The CSIR-NEIST has taken the present initiative as a part of all India project entitled “Phenome India – A long-term longitudinal observational cohort study of health outcomes” initiated by CSIR and led by CSIR-IGIB, New Delhi.
(For more details, Dr Jatin Kalita, Principal Scientist & Head, Research Planning and Business Development Division, CSIR-North East Institute of Science and Technology, Jorhat, Assam Ph.No. 9435557824, Email : jatinkalita@neist.res.in)
