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The Government of the Republic of Serbia

In the service of citizens

Serbia absolute leader in region in coronavirus testing

Belgrade, 2 July 2020

In view of an increased number of new coronavirus cases both in Serbia and the world, the Serbian government wants to inform the public once more about the current testing protocol and the situation regarding tests in Serbia and the region.

Over the past week, a total of 50,797 citizens were tested in the Republic of Serbia. Montenegro did 2,493 tests, Albania 2,779, Slovenia 6,342 and Croatia 7,363 tests. Therefore, over the past 7 days Serbia tested almost three times more citizens than these four countries together.

Also, in terms of total tests per 100,000 citizens Serbia is by far the best in the region since 730 citizens per 100,000 were tested over the past 7 days.

All data presented are publicly available and easily verifiable, given that they are updated daily and all citizens can find them on the Internet.

We reiterate that the citizens who have symptoms of respiratory infections or symptoms of COVID-19 infectious disease (fever, cough, soar throat) must first report to a special clinic (COVID clinic) of their respective community health centre, where they will undergo diagnosis, that is an X-ray examination of lungs, blood test, measuring of body temperature and a quick test.

After that, in consultation with doctors from the COVID clinic, citizens are sent for a free PCR test to a relevant health institution.

According to the current protocol, the epidemiological contacts of those infected are not tested. This means that the persons who have been in contact with the confirmed new coronavirus cases will not be automatically tested until doctors ascertain during the check-up that such testing is necessary.

We reiterate that the same principle is applied in the entire territory of the Republic of Serbia, in every city and municipality without exception. Doctors are the only ones who decide on patient testing on the basis of the testing protocol, and not representatives of local authorities, politicians or anyone else by any means.

The Serbian Public Health Institute “Dr Milan Jovanovic Batut” checks the needs of all public health institutes in the country every morning for that specific day and supplies them daily with additional tests if necessary.

The Serbian government and the COVID-19 Crisis Response Team remind the public that there are currently over 260,000 so-called PCR tests in stock in Serbia and that the amount of tests is regularly refilled in line with needs. Therefore, any allegations on the lack of tests in Serbia are not true.