Good news for all! Now you can test the covid symptoms at home accurately with India’s first self-test covid kit. On Wednesday, the ICMR has approved the indigenous-made Covi-Self test kit for public use. It is manufactured by MyLab Discovery Solutions Ltd. and will soon be available in the market at an affordable price of Rs 250.
Read further to know more about the CoviSelf kit.
What Is A CoviSelf Kit?
via:swarajya
It is a Rapid Antigen test kit that comes with
1.A sterile nasal swab
2.A pre-filled extraction tube to collect the sample,
3.A biohazard bag for safe disposable of nasal swab
4. One test card for predicting results
5. A user manual
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Furthermore, the Pune-based manufacturer has developed an app that will give results accordingly. The app is directly linked to the ICMR covid portal to send the test sample reports of users. It is available on both Apple and Google Play stores.
The kit comes with a manual, users are advised to read it carefully before using the kit. Here is what the manual says:
via:aarp
1. Take the nasal swab and insert 2-4 cm into the nostrils
2. Roll it 5 times inside the nostrils and take out
3. Put the swab in the tube and break the swab portion that is outside the tube. Seal the tube.
4. Now take a test card and put only two drops from the tube
5. Within 10 minutes the card will give you the result
If your test is positive then you’ll get results within 5-7 minutes whereas negative results will take more time. Results taking more than 20 minutes are invalid as per the manual.
Also Read: COVID-19 Survivors’ Tale Of Elderlies To Escalate Your Desire To Live
How to identify the results on Covi-Self?
via:myhealth1st
To check the results, open the MyLab CoviSelf app and scan the test card via your mobile phone’s camera. The app will send you the results within 10 minutes.
There are two sections on the card, C and T. Result on the control section “C” of the test card are negative, and that appearing on both C and T sections is positive.
Who Can Buy?
The Coviself test kit (PathoCatch) is applicable for those having symptoms or those in contact with covid patients. The covid-19 home testing kit is beneficial for both Government and users as it will reduce the burden on labs for frequent RT-PCR tests.
On the other hand, users with mild covid-19 symptoms need not go for RT-PCR frequently. They can test themselves at home and prevent the spread of infection.
Even though the results are negative in symptomatic individuals, home isolation is still necessary as per guidelines of ICMR. However, the home testing kit does not completely eliminate the need for RT-PCR tests.
The home kit will take around 2 weeks to be made available for general use. People can buy the kit either online or directly from pharmacies without any prescription.