ICMR approves first self-use Rapid COVID-19 test 'Coviself'; Mylab kit prices out

A day after the Indian Council for Medical Research (ICMR) issued home testing guidelines, Pune-based Mylab Discovery Solutions on Thursday announced India's first self-use Rapid test 'Coviself', approved by ICMR. Issuing a press release, each Coviself test kit provided with all testing materials, instructions to use (IFU) leaflet and a biohazard bag to safely dispose after testing and is priced at Rs 250. Mylab was the same company that had developed India's first  RTPCR test a year ago.

MyLab produces first self-use Rapid COVID test

“This is the biggest crisis our country has ever faced. Time and again, we have tried to observe carefully what our country needs and developed solutions with social benefit at the core. With CoviSelf, we are sharing the power of testing early with the citizens. It will save thousands of lives. For India, we will make millions of kits available at fraction of the cost of such kits in the US,“ said Mylab MD Hasmukh Rawal. 

The test kit will be priced at Rs 250 and available in a pack of one.  Mylab current production capacity is 70
lakh tests per week and plans to increase its capacity to 1 Crore tests per week within 14 days. It will start shipping out tests within a few days, stated the press release.

ICMR issues home-testing guidelines

On Wednesday, ICMR issued an advisory for COVID-19 Home Testing using Rapid Antigen Tests (RATs). As per the advisory issued by ICMR, home testing using RATs is advised only in symptomatic individuals and immediate contacts of laboratory-confirmed positive cases. ICMR also warned that indiscriminate testing is not advised and that the COVID home testing should be conducted as per the procedure described by the manufacturer in the user manual.

ICMR also stated,  "The home testing mobile app is available in the Google Play Store and Apple store and must be downloaded by all users. The mobile app is a comprehensive guide of the testing procedure and will provide 'positive' or 'negative' results to the patient". The newly issued advisory informed that all the users of RAT kits are advised to click a picture of the test strip after completing the test procedure with the same mobile phone, which has been used for downloading the mobile application and user registration. The data will reportedly be captured in a secured server and uploaded to ICMR COVID-19 testing portal.