Indian Firms Set To Make Test Kits

Mass production of antibody test kits to help win COVID-19 war

- PB Jayakumar

With India giving the green signal for commercial manufacture of Elisa-based antibody detection test for coronavirus, more Indian companies are likely to enter the market soon. Elisa stands for Enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay.

The companies likely to make a foray into this segment include Biocon's Syngene and medical devices maker Transasia.

Union Health Minister Dr Harsh Vardhan said on Sunday that technology for an indigenous Elisa test named Covid Kavach Elisa developed by the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR)-National Institute of Virology (NIV) at Pune has been transferred to Ahmedabad-based drugmaker Zydus Cadila for mass-scale production. It was validated at two sites in Mumbai and can test 90 samples together in a single run of 2.5 hours. Zydus Cadila is yet to divulge details of its production plans.