COVID-19 Rapid Tests: A Milestone in Fight Against the Pandemic

Yesterday evening, I joined global health partners from the COVID-19 ACT-Accelerator to announce a ground-breaking agreement that will provide access to 120 million rapid tests for COVID-19 to low-and middle-income countries. The Global Fund has committed an initial US$50 million from our COVID-19 Response Mechanism to enable countries to purchase at least 10 million of the new tests, but more funding is urgently needed to meet the unmet demand. The following are my remarks from yesterday’s WHO press conference.

Being able to deploy well-performing rapid tests will be a significant step forward in enabling countries to contain and combat COVID-19. The tests are not a silver bullet, but they are hugely valuable as a complement to existing polymerase-chain reaction (or PCR) tests. Although they are slightly less accurate, they are much cheaper and faster and don’t require a lab.

The significance of this announcement is the entire package. The partners have come together to secure volume for low-and middle-income countries, to provide funding, and to provide technical support on the ground to expedite roll-out and ensure the most effective usage.  

This will enable low- and middle-income countries to begin to close the dramatic gap in testing between rich and poor countries and this is a big step towards more equitable allocation. Right now, high-income countries are conducting 292 tests daily per 100,000 people. For upper-middle-income countries, that number is 77, for lower-middle-income countries 61, and for low-income countries 14.

There are still challenges. Fully utilizing the volume guarantee for 120 million tests will require US$600 million, which we don’t yet have. And even 120 million tests over 6 months, while a massive increase over what has been available so far, represents a fraction of what is really required. If low- and middle-income countries were to test at the same rate high-income countries are testing right now, 120 million tests would not last two weeks. Moreover, with the emergence of these antigen-based rapid diagnostic tests, we are likely to see testing rates increase significantly in countries at every income level.   

The Global Fund anticipates using at least US$50 million from our COVID-19 Response Mechanism to support countries in procuring these tests (as well continuing to support countries in procuring PCR tests). We anticipate the first orders this week. Our ability to continue to fund countries in purchasing these tests will be a function of the support we get from donors for our COVID-19 response.

But the volume guarantees are not tied to any particular purchasing mechanism or source of funds. So we will be working with our partners in the Diagnostics Consortium to make access to these tests as easy as possible. For example, we will allow countries to use our procurement platform to buy these tests in cases where they have funding from other sources.

It was Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the Director-General of WHO, who said early on in the crisis, “test, test, test.” Experience since then has, if anything, reinforced the central importance of testing to fighting COVID-19. With these new tests, we hope to give low- and middle-income countries new testing tools that can serve as an important step in enabling the countries to be even more effective in containing and combating the pandemic, saving lives, protecting communities and enabling economies to restart. 

Photo Credit: World Bank / Henitsoa Rafalia