First home-base COVID-19 testing kit ‘Coviself’ to be available soon

Self-testing kit for COVID-19 approved for symptomatic patients. The Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) has approved a home-based Rapid Antigen Testing (RAT) kit name ‘Coviself’.

As per the announcement, the testing kit is advised to be used only on symptomatic individuals and in cases of immediate contacts of laboratory-confirmed positive cases.

This home bases rapid antigen testing kit manufactured by Mylab Discovery Solutions Ltd, Pune has been approved and validated for use. The only nasal swab will be required for this rapid antigen testing.

The procedure to conduct the test has been described by the manufacturer in the user manual, accompanying the kit.

According to ICMR, the home mobile app is available in Google Play Store and Apple Store. People taking the test will have to upload pictures of the testing strip from the phone used for registration and user download. The data will be updated in the central ICMR testing portal while maintaining confidentiality. However, all individuals who test positive through the RAT kit may be considered true positives. RAT negative symptomatic individuals may be treated as suspect COVID-19 cases. These individuals are advised to follow the ICMR/Ministry of Health home isolation protocol while awaiting the artificial RT-PCR test result.