Mylab launches do-it-yourself covid-19 test kit CoviSelf at ₹250

News Update on Coviself

NEW DELHI : Mylab Discovery Solutions on Thursday announced that it has received the Indian Council of Medical Research’s (ICMR) approval for the country’s first self-use rapid antigen test for Covid-19, CoviSelf.

The test can be purchased for ₹250 without a prescription from local pharmacies and online channel partners, the company said in a statement.

Source: LiveMint

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Companies Statement:

“The company will start shipping out tests within a few days. Mylab current production capacity is 7 million tests per week and plans to increase its capacity to 10 million tests per week within 14 days,” the company said.

The launch of the test kit follows ICMR allowing self-testing kit in a new advisory late Wednesday. However, it also said indiscriminate testing is not advised.

The testing will be monitored using Mylab’s mobile phone application, through which users are advised to click a picture of the test strip after completing the test procedure.

“This easy-to-use test combines with Myab’s AI-powered mobile app so that a user can know his/her positive status, submit the result to ICMR directly for traceability, and know what to do next in either case of result,” Mylab director Sujit Jain said.

Mylab said this will ease pressure on already overburdened testing labs and reduce delays in testing, which is more than 72 hours in some parts of the country.

ICMR’s latest advisory and Mylab’s test kit launch follows a severe delays in covid-19 testing during the second wave as laboratories are overburdened with mounting requests while also dealing with manpower crunch from infected staff.

Earlier this month, ICMR had advised states to increase dependence on rapid antigen test to reduce the burden on laboratories and also recommended that they do away with the requirement of negative RT-PCR tests for inter-state travel.

Over the last two months, India has seen a rapid surge in the number of covid-19 cases which has been called the second wave, with daily new cases at till about earlier this month crossing 400,000 on a regular basis. On Wednesday, over 276,000 new cases were reported in India, while nearly 3,900 patients died.