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Spitting contest: Indonesian, Singaporean firms offer saliva-based COVID-19 tests
State-owned pharmaceutical holding company PT Bio Farma recently released a spit sample COVID-19 test kit named Bio Saliva developed in cooperation with genomic technology start-up Nusantics.
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wo companies from Indonesia and Singapore have developed saliva-based COVID-19 polymerase chain reaction (PCR) test kits that are said to be more efficient, more comfortable but nearly as accurate as throat or nasal swabs.
State-owned pharmaceutical holding company PT Bio Farma recently released a spit sample COVID-19 test kit named Bio Saliva developed in cooperation with genomic technology start-up Nusantics.
The kit has a sensitivity rate of 88.89 to 93.57 percent for detecting COVID-19, according to a Bio Farma press release from Saturday, not far below the 95 percent achieved with nasopharyngeal or oropharyngeal swabs, the gold standard for PCR testing.
“During the clinical and validation trial, we distributed Bio Saliva to several cities on the island of Java, but for commercial use, we limit them to two labs at the moment,” Nusantics CEO Sharlini Eriza Putri told The Jakarta Post in an interview on Monday.
As of Saturday, the Bio Saliva tests are available at Genomik Solidaritas Indonesia (GSI) laboratories in Kuningan and Cilandak, South Jakarta. More Bio Farma partner laboratories are to process Bio Saliva samples in the future.
Read also: Pandemic doesn't spell windfall for Indonesia's pharma industry
Sharlini said that while the Bio Saliva kit was priced at no more than Rp 250,000 (US$17.26), users may have to pay up to Rp 800,000, as PCR laboratories would impose sample processing fees.
The test kit received a distribution permit from the Health Ministry on April 1 after a seven-month verification process by Diponegoro University Medical School, Diponegoro National Hospital (RSND) and Doctor Kariadi Hospital (RSDK).
“Many people don’t feel comfortable when their nose is poked [with a cotton swab], so we tried to find another method to collect samples that still come from the nose and throat,” Sharlini said.
She went on to explain that Bio Saliva users were required to gargle, spit into a test tube and then send the sample to a PCR test lab. Their result would come out within 24 hours.
Sharlini noted that access to PCR tests in Indonesia was still limited, as most PCR laboratories and technicians were located in big cities. Swab samples also needed to be stored in cold cases, complicating their transportation from rural areas.
“Gargle samples can be transferred at room temperature, so we hope that this type of PCR test can help national [COVID-19] testing and tracing throughout Indonesia, even in remote villages,” she said.
Read also: Nusantics raises series A funds, develops third-generation COVID-19 test kits
Meanwhile, Singapore-based medical technology company Nalagenetics has developed a saliva-based COVID-19 test kit called QuickSpit.
The company claimed that the “concordance” of QuickSpit results was at 97 percent when compared to conventional PCR tests.
Results of a clinical trial for the test kit were ready to be published in a peer-reviewed journal at the time of writing, but Nalagenetics obtained a distribution permit for the test kit from the Health Ministry on June 26.
Nalagenetics has set up seven PCR laboratories for COVID-19 testing across Indonesia, the latest one at a hospital in Kalimantan.
“We hope the convenience and [affordability] of QuickSpit will also allow COVID-19 testing to reach remote areas where medical facilities are scarce and resources are low,” the company’s genetics team colead, Caroline Mahendra, said in a press statement on July 1.
Users collect samples at home by depositing their saliva into the QuickSpit tube after fasting for 30 minutes. They then send the tube to a designated lab and receive the test result on the same day or the day after.
Nalagenetics has partnered with health check services online platform Triasse to process the samples. The platform offers the QuickSpit test at a price of Rp 570,000 for a next-day result and Rp 600,000 for a same-day result.
