Govt approves indigenous antibody detection test

Govt approves indigenous antibody detection test

TIMES NEWS NETWORK

New Delhi:  11.05.2020

The government has approved an indigenous antibody detection test for Covid-19, which will enable health authorities to do surveillance testing to see how much of the population has been exposed to coronavirus infection. Once these antibody test kits are manufactured indigenously, it will reduce India’s dependence on countries like China for testing kits.

The National Institute of Virology (NIV) in Pune has developed and validated the indigenous IgG ELISA test ‘Covid Kavach Elisa’ for antibody detection for Covid-19. While real-time RT-PCR is the frontline test for clinical diagnosis of SARS-CoV-2, robust antibody tests are critical for surveillance to understand how much of the population has been exposed to infection.

An official statement said, “NIV’s competent scientific team successfully isolated the SARS-CoV-2 virus from laboratory-confirmed patients in India. This, in turn, has paved the way for the development of indigenous diagnostics for SARS-CoV-2.”

The indigenous antibody test will eliminate the need for low-quality Chinese kits — recently, Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) had to return about 500,000 such kits after they malfunctioned, with variable results.

According to official sources, the test was validated at two sites in Mumbai and was “found to have high sensitivity and specificity”. “In addition, the test will have the advantage of testing 90 samples together in a single run of 2.5 hours. Moreover, ELISAbased testing is easily possible even at the district level as the ELISA kit has inactivated virus,” a source said. This will make it easier to distribute kits at the panchayat level.

The ELISA (enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay) test is used to detect antibodies in the blood for a wide variety of infections, particularly HIV. India has a history of being able to successfully combat HIV-AIDS. With the new indigenous antibody test, India will be able to use the existing infrastructure.

The statement said the test had the advantage of having much higher sensitivity and specificity as compared to the several rapid test kits which have recently flooded the Indian market. Health minister Harsh Vardhan said, “The robust indigenous IgG ELISA test for antibody detection developed by ICMR-NIV, Pune will play a critical role in surveillance of proportion of the population exposed to SARSCoV-2 coronavirus infection.”

The test will have the advantage of testing 90 samples together in a single run of 2.5 hours. ELISA-based testing is easily possible even at the district level as the kit has inactivated virus

OFFICIAL SOURCE