Feb. 1 (UPI) — The Biden administration on Monday announced a $232 million contract for a new at-home rapid COVID-19 test that gives results via cell phone in 15 minutes.
The award, co-sponsored by the departments of Defense and Health and Human Services, gives Australian-based Ellume’s U.S. subsidiary the capacity to increase manufacturing of the rapid test by 19 million test kits per month, Andy Slavitt, COVID-19 adviser for the White House, said in a news conference Monday.
“These self-test kits have a 95% accuracy,” Slavitt said. Tests can be used for people with symptoms, or for people without symptoms so they can attend public events or return to work or school, he said. The kits are designed with a less-invasive nasal swab than other nasopharyngeal COVID-19 tests, he said.
The swab is read by a “digital analyzer” which sends a signal to a cell phone via Bluetooth in about 15 minutes, Slavitt said Monday.
The Ellume diagnostic test was developed with the National Institutes of Health’s Rapid Acceleration of Diagnostics (RADx) initiative program beginning in May 2020. Ellume received a Food and Drug Administration Emergency Use Authorization to create 100,000 test kits per month, but the new grant will bump up the number of kits produced, with 8.5 million guaranteed to be sold in the United States.
“Making easy-to-use tests available to every American is a priority with obvious benefits,” Slavitt said.
The test will cost about $30, but Slavitt said costs could go down as manufacturing supplies increase.
“Things that are not low cost and accessible don’t do all the good we need,” Slavitt said. “Life doesn’t change until we create more ubiquitous capability” for rapid testing, he added.
