Coronavirus: Russia launches lottery screening campaign

Text by: RFI Follow

To combat the Covid-19, Russia has performed more than 6 million tests to date. The authorities want to go even further by launching a massive detection campaign by lot.

Publicity

With our correspondent in Moscow, Daniel Vallot

The first draw will take place this Friday, May 15. According to Moscow mayor Sergei Sobyanin, no less than 70,000 residents of the capital will be randomly selected and then invited to go to a screening center. The personal results will be communicated to each participant, with medical recommendations. The overall results will be made public and will be taken into account by the local authorities to decide whether or not to lift the containment.

Sergei Sobianin specifies that the operation will be renewed every three days and that it will be of an unprecedented scale in the world. This massive, free and random screening should allow local authorities to know both the number of infected people and the course of the disease.

After having delayed detecting the disease in the population, Russia has reversed the trend in recent weeks and has increased the number of tests to isolate the carriers of the virus as quickly as possible. Over 6 million tests have been performed to date. In the eyes of the authorities, this strategy has borne fruit, since the number of victims of the virus has remained relatively low, with less than 2,400 dead according to official figures.

Several media contested these figures, however, believing that they were undervalued. Among them, the Financial Times and the New York Times are now accused of "  disinformation  " by the Russian authorities.

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