PTI has reported that a bench of Chief Justice D N Patel and Justice Jasmeet Singh also directed the Delhi government to "widely publicize" its April 23 circular on the matter.

The order came while disposing of a PIL seeking directions to the Delhi government to order hospitals not to insist on COVID positive reports to hospitalize patients who show symptoms of coronavirus.

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The petitioner told the bench that the Uttar Pradesh government has passed such a direction on not insisting on RTPCR positive test reports for admitting patients.

The Delhi government told the court that its Health department has issued a circular on April 23 directing hospitals in the city not to insist on COVID positive test reports to admit patients who are showing symptoms of coronavirus infection.

The Delhi government told the bench that such patients would be kept in a dedicated area, in hospitals, meant for suspected cases.

The HC bench has further requested the AAP government to set up more testing centers in view of the rise in COVID-19 cases in the national capital which is recording around 24,000 fresh infections for the last few days.

The HC bench further asked the Delhi government to put in place necessary infrastructure to streamline the sample collection process, adds PTI.

The direction was issued by the court after several lawyers told the bench that they were facing difficulty in getting tested as labs were saying they will carry out sample collection after 2-3 days.

The lawyers claimed that the number of daily tests has gone down to around 60,000 from the over one lakh tests that were being conducted earlier. These submissions were made during the hearing of the PIL seeking directions to the Delhi government to order hospitals not to insist on COVID positive reports to hospitalize patients who show symptoms of coronavirus.

Delhi recorded 350 COVID-19 deaths on Sunday and 22,933 cases with a positivity rate of 30.21 percent.