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Pandemic brings several new technologies to lab testing, experts say
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The UAE has successfully battled the Covid-19 pandemic with mass testing and a national vaccination programme. The country’s death rate is among the lowest in the world.
Proper diagnostic tests to identify Covid-19 infections are an essential part of the UAE’s health system, according to an expert.
“The large-scale, laboratory-based testing strategy implemented across the UAE has had a very large impact on containing and controlling the spread of the coronavirus,” said Hosam Fouad, founder and CEO of Abu Dhabi-based Life Diagnostics.
“The massive testing program has helped the country and most businesses continue to operate without a complete lockdown.”
“During the Covid-19 pandemic, we have been testing a massive amount of testing that we have never experienced before. We have to scale up our resources and have to make a huge effort to meet the government’s vision of a mass testing strategy, ‘ Fouad told Cali era During the 2022 AACC Middle East Conference at the Grand Hyatt Dubai on Saturday.
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As of 15 November 2020, the UAE has conducted 15 million polymerase chain reaction (PCR) tests for SARS-COV-2.
As of 5 November 2022, the UAE has performed 19.9 million PCR tests, 19 times the population of the country.
The number of tests per day ranged from 10,000 tests per day at the end of March to 120,000 tests per day in November 2020.
In his keynote speech at the Laboratory Medicine conference, Fouad noted that the main challenge facing nearly every Covid-19 testing laboratory is uncertainty. “If you were to ask me now when the Covid-19 pandemic will end, the answer I can give is ‘I don’t know.’ It’s been that way since the early days of the pandemic,” Fouad said.
“It’s hard for us to tell if we need more machines or hire more people, and how long and how many test kits it will take.”
Human resources and recruiters are a challenge for medical labs as they need more workers to handle mass testing, the expert said. Sometimes, they have to bring in experts from other countries, which is expensive.
“The healthcare authorities in the UAE are very supportive of us. They have played an important role in simplifying the licensing process for us and we can hire new staff. It has helped us attract workers from all over the world,” Fouad said.
According to experts, Covid-19 has introduced several new technologies for laboratory testing.
“Before Covid-19, PCR testing was very complicated and very expensive. Today, it has become more affordable. We now have trained experts, new machines and many laboratories with testing capabilities,” Fouad said.
“Many normal tests that used to be processed using different techniques are now being processed using PCR technology.”
The meeting was organized by Abu Dhabi-based Life Diagnostics in partnership with the American Association for Clinical Chemistry AACC.
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