NIV Pune develops India's first anti-body test kit ELISA, mass production to begin soon

The National Institute of Virology (NIV), Pune has successfully developed India's first indigenous antibody testing kit – ELISA to fight COVID-19, Union Health Minister Dr. Harsh Vardhan said on Sunday, May 10.

ELISA, which stands for Enzyme-Linked Immunosorbent Assay, is an antibody testing kit similar to rapid antibody tests that detect antibodies in the blood to find out if a person is infected with COVID-19.

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Key features of the indigenous test kit

As per the ICMR officials, the ELISA kit is more reliable and cheaper than rapid antibody testing kits that are imported from foreign companies to test COVID-19 infection in India. This kit is said to have high sensitivity and accuracy. It has the advantage of testing 90 samples together in a single run of 2.5 hours so that healthcare professionals can proceed quickly to the next steps, Dr. Harsh Vardhan said. 

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Mass production to commence soon

ICMR has transferred the technology to Zydus Cadila for mass-scale production of the ELISA test kits. Zydus Cadila is an innovation-driven global healthcare company. It has proactively taken up the challenge to accelerate the commercial production of the ELISA test kits to make it available for use at the earliest. The test kit has been named as “COVID KAVACH ELISA.”

As per reports, ICMR has planned to use this ELISA kit to conduct a study in about 75 districts having the maximum number of COVID-19 cases across the country.

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(With ANI inputs; Image credits - PTI file photo)