BHU researchers design new Covid-19 test kit

On Tuesday, researchers from the Banaras Hindu University (BHU) informed that its Department of Molecular and Human Genetics had invented a new Covid-19 test kit that can give precise results in 5-6 hours. The BHU researchers have filed for a patent for its commercial production, but there’s still a long way to go before the test kit is approved for commercial production. According to Dr. Geeta Rai, associate professor of the department, they have used the RTPCR method. This has been used as the screening method for COVID-19 globally. She further stated they had developed primers that target the particular sequence which was only present in COVID-19.

Covid-19 sequence unique

The BHU researcher stated that the Covid-19 sequence was not found in any other viruses like SARS. She was hopeful that when testing would be done, it would only detect the COVID-19 sequence and it would decrease the chances of getting a false positive. The conceptualisation took place in early March and the patent was filed at the Indian Patent Office. Their objective was to make sure that small diagnostic labs could buy the device. They are hopeful that the cost of the test would also be very low.

As of now, it is at the research stage and it would only come into use once it is approved by the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR). The Union Health Ministry informed that the death tally on account of COVID-19 has risen to 50 and the number of total active coronavirus cases to 1,965 as on Wednesday.

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