New Delhi, Aug 17 - Struggling to cope with the rush of suspected swine flu cases, the government is planning to outsource H1N1 tests to select private diagnostic centres to reduce the backlog and to ensure that patients get their results on time.

'The health ministry said they are likely to shift their load to some of us but only after they are satisfied with our proficiency,' said Ashok Rattan, Super Religare Laboratories (SRL) advisor.

'They have told us that the result must come within 24 hours,' Rattan told IANS.

'We will undergo a proficiency test. We hope we will satisfy them during real life testing of samples under their supervision during proficiency test. Soon after, government will be our customer. We also have fixed Rs.4,000 as our charge to government to test a sample when they give it to us,' he added.

While the government plans to outsource H1N1 diagnostics, it is also going ahead with its proposal to let patients go directly to private labs for getting themselves tested for the viral disease. SRL says it will charge private individuals the same amount - Rs.4,000 - for a test once the government's green signal comes in.

The health ministry had earlier said that it costs the government Rs.10,000 to carry out a positive tests and Rs. 5,000-6,000 for a negative one.

On Friday, SRL and five other laboratories went through an orientation programme.

'They (government) told us about the precautions and protection we need to take care of during the transportation of samples and testing,' said Rattan.

Besides SRL, the others likely to get a pie of the testing job are Dr. Lal's Pathlab, Piramal, Quest, Auroprobe and Era Health.

According to Rattan, who is also head of the Fortis Clinical Research team, the National Centre for Disease Control (formerly NICD), the National Institute of Virology (NIV) and other government labs were doing a great job and the outsourcing plan was just to 'provide quick and reliable service.