Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, July 20) — Personnel of accredited COVID-19 testing centers ought to go through training and take a proficiency examination before using the new batch of local test kits developed by Filipino scientists, the Department of Health said Monday.
Health spokesperson Maria Rosario Vergeire told a media forum that those were among the conditions they set when they approved Manila HealthTek Inc.’s Corona Virus Disease-2019 (COVID-19) rRT-PCR Detection Kit for commercial use.
Vergeire said this is to ascertain “accurate test results.”
The low-cost kits received its certificate of product registration in April. But they were recalled in May due to “minor defects.”
FDA earlier said the imported reagents had been contaminated, yielding “indeterminate” results in 30 percent of the samples tested.
But Vergeire said the manufacturer fixed the deficiencies last week.
