UAE Covid: Antibody test kit to assess vaccine efficacy

G42 Healthcare and GenScript Biotech Singapore on Wednesday announced an agreement to explore comprehensive solutions to fight Covid-19 pandemic.

As part of the collaboration, the GenScript cPass SARS-CoV-2 neutralisation antibody detection kit will be distributed across 24 locations in the region to assess effectiveness of vaccines.

The kit detects neutralising antibodies in individuals without the use of a live SARS-CoV-2, which causes Covid-19. The conventional method of measuring neutralising antibodies in patient samples requires the use of live cells and a high biosafety level environment (BSL3), and results are obtained after several days. However, the cPass kit utilises pure proteins and can be performed in most standard laboratories in less than an hour.

Neutralising antibodies represent the first line of defence against the infection by blocking the virus from binding to the host cells, and as a result, inhibits viral propagation. The cPass test may be an essential tool for the detection of the neutralising (virus blocking) antibody response at post-vaccination to understand the robustness, efficacy, and longevity of the immune response.

The cPass kit is the only US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) emergency use authorised serology test for neutralising antibodies from recent and prior SARS-CoV-2 infections. It has recently received clearance from the UAE Ministry of Health and Prevention (MoHAP) as a medical device.

Johnson Wang, Asia-Pacific President of GenScript Biotech, said: “With this collaboration, we will join forces to serve the local community with our expertise and resources. Our company remains committed to supporting the healthcare community in combating Covid-19 infections, with a broad portfolio of research and development tools and diagnostics, including the novel cPass kit.”

Ashish Koshy, chief executive officer (CEO), G42 Healthcare, said: “Our mission is to provide the definitive, comprehensive and most technologically advanced healthcare solutions in the GCC region. Our collaboration with GenScript Biotech comes at a time when countries have successfully rolled out national vaccination programmes and laboratories can now benefit from rapid detection of the antibodies, thus supporting the healthcare ecosystem. Our commitment is to uphold patient health and reinforce our credentials as a transformation enabler in healthcare for the good of all humanity.”

The detection kit offers high throughput, with higher sensitivity and specificity to neutralising antibodies because of being independent of isotype and virus species.

• Dubai
• Abu Dhabi