Kerala: Antibody kits faulty, tests restricted to airports

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Health department has decided to temporarily suspend antibody testing in Kerala as testing kits have failed quality test. The department asked HLL Lifecare to withdraw the batches supplied to Kerala Medical Supplies Corporation Ltd (LTD) and supply a fresh batch. But, this will not affect testing at the airports as kits procured by KMSCL from other agencies will now be fully utilized at airports.
HLL Lifecare had first supplied 10,000 kits to Kerala and in the internal validation done at state public health laboratory the kits failed.Then the kits were sent for testing at NIV units in Alappuzha and Pune. It passed the quality tests and hence the government used these kits among high-risk groups .
Later, the chief secretary-level panel then suggested procurement of 40,000 kits from HLL Lifecare and the state received 15,000 kits that again failed quality test. “Every time the firm supplies kits, each batch will be subjected to internal validation. In this lot, one batch failed the quality test, again. The testing report submitted to the health secretary said the sensitivity rate of the kits were low,” said a senior health department official.
Following this, the department asked the supplier to take back the said batch and supply a fresh one. “Since, the firm is the lowest-bidder, we have asked them to supply more kits. If they are unable to meet the demand of the health department, then we will have to go with the second-lowest bidder to ensure supply,” said the senior health official.
Meanwhile, HLL Lifecare has been asked to set up testing kiosks at all 4 airports in state.