SARS-CoV-2 or COVID-19 is virus that is currently spreading throughout the world. Relatively little is understood about the virus but we are learning fast and it is clear that we need to have good diagnosis to support quarantine and treatment. What is known is that the virus has a serial interval of 4 days and 1-3% of the population may be pre-symptomatic but still transmitting the virus. It takes 2-14 days to show symptoms after infection with the 97% of people developing symptoms within 11.5 days. There is a clear global challenge to halt the spread of this disease and to strengthen the ability of all healthcare systems to cope better with future epidemics. Key to this is accurate fast diagnostic testing for the virus or immune status of patients. AgPlus' diagnostic assays for detecting specific immune responses to the COVID-19 virus will allow for a) confirmatory testing (rule in rule out) of those with symptoms, understanding that in some instances the symptoms may be due to bacterial infection b) monitoring treatment efficacy in those that have tested positive to ensure they are responding and when safe to release from isolation c) potential to be a companion diagnostic to support drug/ vaccine development and d) to determine if you have had a COVID-19 infection.

SARS-CoV-2 or COVID-19 is currently spreading throughout the world. Little is understood about the virus but we are learning fast and it is clear that we need to have good, accurate diagnosis to support quarantine and treatment. What is known is that the virus has a serial interval of 4 days and 1-3% of the population may be pre-symptomatic but still transmitting the virus. It takes 2-14 days to show symptoms after infection with the 97% of people developing symptoms within 11.5 days. This is a global challenge to halt the spread of the disease before our healthcare systems become overwhelmed. AgPlus' diagnostic assay for detecting specific immune responses to the COVID-19 virus will allow for a) confirmatory testing (rule in rule out) of those with symptoms, understanding that in some instances the symptoms may be due to bacterial infection b) monitoring treatment efficacy in those that have tested positive to ensure they are responding and when safe to release from isolation c) potential to be a companion diagnostic to support drug/ vaccine development d) test to confirm if patient has previously been infected with COVID-19\.

AgPlus Diagnostics produces medical test devices that can be used by a doctor to give patients information on their health in less than 10 minutes during a single doctor’s appointment. Our medical device is used by inserting a test cartridge into a handheld reader that performs the medical test using AgPlus’s unique signal detection chemistry. This is called electrochemical signalling and requires a particular component called a carbon electrode to be built into the test cartridges in order to work. The electrodes are made by another company and we have found that around one third of these electrodes are defective which can lead to a wrong medical test result. At AgPlus, we must screen out these defective electrodes during manufacturing but currently we cannot do that until we have fully made the medical test cartridge. This is very wasteful, so AgPlus needs to better understand what causes this problem with our electrodes. Based on this knowledge, we can determine the best approach for the electrode manufacturer to minimise these losses. Also we will then have a test to check each batch of electrodes at AgPlus when we receive them from the supplier so that the defective ones can to screened out and discarded as early as possible in the manufacturing process. This will help our company reduce manufacturing costs and material wastage significantly. The knock-on effect of this is that it will help AgPlus sell more tests and for the company to grow and employ more skilled people.