Updated @ 11:05 p.m., Feb. 5, 2020
MANILA, Philippines — The Research Institute for Tropical Medicine (RITM) would be accrediting two government and two private hospitals that could help in the confirmation of specimens for the novel coronavirus (2019-nCoV).
Department of Health (DOH) Undersecretary Eric Domingo said in a press conference Wednesday that RITM is eyeing the accreditation of government and private hospitals that have capabilities for sequence data polymerase chain reaction (PCR) assays.
“[It was a] directive during a meeting with the President, for RITM to accredit other laboratories in the country,” he said.
Initially, DOH sent samples to the Victorian Infectious Diseases Reference Laboratory in Australia for 2019-nCoV confirmation until RITM has recently brought ribonucleic acid (RNA) primers to perform the test.
“Merong maybe two government hospitals and maybe two private hospitals that have PCR capability. Kaya lang it is a new test. Maraming kailangan i-che-check like a biosafety facility just to make sure that this virus doesn’t get out,” Domingo said.
(Maybe there are two government hospitals and maybe two private hospitals that have PCR capability. However, it is a new test. A lot needs to be checked like a biosafety facility just to make sure that the virus doesn’t get out.)
“Once they [hospitals] have proven their capability, the directive of Secretary of RITM is to accredit competent laboratories,” Domingo added.
The World Health Organization (WHO) said on its official website that 2019-nCoV cases were confirmed through metagenomic sequencing while sequence data PCR assays were created for clinical diagnostic use.
Test kits for nCoV
Domingo said WHO is also asking the Philippine Genome Center (PGC) to submit the test kits that would help detect cases of 2019-nCoV.
“The genome center has a test kit din (also) and they were advised to send [it] to WHO for validation, and it takes them two weeks,” Domingo said.
Domingo said there are many test kits being sold online but the kits have yet to be validated by WHO.
In a press conference at Malate, Manila, Dr. Edsel Salvana, director of the National Institutes of Health’s (NIH) Institute of Molecular Biology and Biotechnology, said the NIH partnered with PGC to develop its own kit to confirm cases of the new coronavirus.
Dr. Diana Edralin, medical adviser at the Pharmaceutical and Healthcare Association of the Philippines, said they would be willing to work with government to use their test kits to help in verifying nCoV cases.
“Companies are willing to partner with the government if there is a demand for more tests, we are willing… There are different kinds of tests but we are willing to help to complement what the government has started. We are ready,” Edralin said, speaking in partly in Filipino.
“We are ready to support the government to make these assays available easily in the Philippines to fast track the diagnosis for nCoV,” she added.
Salvana clarified that before test kits will be used, the RITM and other health authorities must undergo further evaluation to approve the capability of test kits.