- Abbott Laboratories (NYSE: ABT) is in the process of testing its rapid coronavirus test on asymptomatic people in order to get to the next step of expanding FDA authorization
Abbott Laboratories (NYSE: ABT) is in the process of testing its rapid coronavirus test on asymptomatic people in order to get to the next step of expanding FDA authorization, according to CNBC. This was revealed by Abbott Labs CEO Robert Ford in an interview.
This past week, Abbott Labs received emergency use authorization from the Food and Drug Administration for its new coronavirus antigen test — which the company sells for $5 and can determine results in 15 minutes.
How is Abbott’s authorization for the test from the FDA limited? The test can be used only within seven days of someone having coronavirus symptoms and in consultation with a healthcare provider, meaning it is unauthorized to test presymptomatic people or those who are not having symptoms. However, Ford said the company has hopes to expand beyond the current FDA approval.
“We are working on developing data for asymptomatic claims, so we are running our clinical trial, and we’ll eventually have data to be able to support that,” said Ford in an interview with CNBC’s Meg Tirrell on the show Power Lunch.
The Abbott — which is called BinaxNOW — will be able to substantially speed up the turnaround time for COVID-19 results within the US. The test does not require lab equipment for delivering results. And it is portable and can easily be placed in doctor’s offices of all sizes.
The US government had secured a deal for at least 150 million of Abbott’s tests valued at $760 million with the hopes to deploy it at nursing homes and schools. Ford also published an op-ed on CNBC this week emphasizing the importance of rapid antigen tests like BinaxNOW since it eliminates lengthy waiting times. COVID-19 cases are still surging in the US and the widespread delays for lab-based testing results are causing issues since people have to know whether they need to self-isolate or not.
“Rapid tests deliver actionable results quickly so that infected patients can immediately begin self-quarantine. This test, along with others like it, is risk reduction on a societal scale,” explained Ford in the op-ed.
HHS Secretary Alex Azar noted that Abbott’s antigen test has been the “incredibly valuable result of President Trump’s all-of-America approach to constructing our world-leading COVID-19 testing capacity.”
The BinaxNOW COVID-19 Ag Card test is the size of a credit card. And the results from the test appear on Abbott’s free Navica app, which is supported on iOS and Android.
