SALT LAKE CITY — A Utah based company is working to get ahead of the spread of the coronavirus by creating a testing kit that can be shipped all over the world.
The Logix Smart COVID-19 Detection Kit was created by Co-Diagnostics in Salt Lake City and was recently approved by the Food and Drug Administration to be sent to labs all around the world.
“This is something that’s going to keep happening to us and we have to be able to respond more quickly and more rapidly anywhere in the world,” said Joseph Featherstone, the head of business development for Co-Diagnostics.
Here's how it works:
Doctors take a sample of blood or sputum using a nasal or oral swab.
The sample is put into a centrifuge and then into a testing box.
“What happens is we put in the tube that sample with our co-primers with our technology and then that goes in here and we close that up and we can run 48 tests at a time,” Featherstone said.
If the samples flat lines, it means there is no virus, but if they spike, it means the coronavirus is present.
“As this thing mutates, which it’s already doing by the way, and will continue to do, we want to be in a position where we say, 'okay, what do we need to do now to stay ahead of this,'” Featherstone said.
Featherstone said the kits could be used on cruise ships, like the Grand or Diamond Princess, where they’ve seen many coronavirus cases.
“Our thought is, let’s take something like this, set it up in the ship or anywhere else, and designate that area as a lab," Featherstone said. "Give people protective gear and have trained people who can run the test and you can do this literally within a matter of a few hours."
So far Co-Diagnostics has shipped the kits to dozens of labs in the U.S. and even more around the world.
