Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR)-National Institute of Virology (NIV) at Pune has developed and validated the indigenous IgG ELISA test “COVID KAVACH ELISA” for antibody detection for COVID-19.

The test was validated at two sites in Mumbai and has been found to have high sensitivity and specificity. In addition, the test will have the advantage of testing 90 samples together in a single run of 2.5 hours.

Moreover, ELISA based testing is easily possible even at district level as the ELISA kit has inactivated virus. There are also minimal bio-safety and bio-security requirements as compared to the real-time RT-PCR test. The test has an advantage of having much higher sensitivity and specificity as compared to the several rapid test kits which have recently flooded the Indian market.

Speaking on the occasion, Dr. Harsh Vardhan said, “The robust indigenous IgG ELISA test for antibody detection developed by ICMR-NIV, Pune will play a critical role in surveillance of proportion of population exposed to SARS-CoV-2 Coronavirus infection.”

ICMR has partnered with Zydus Cadila for mass scale production of the ELISA test kits. After development at ICMR-NIV, Pune, technology has been transferred for mass scale production to Zydus Cadila, which is an innovation driven global healthcare company. Zydus has proactively taken up the challenge to expedite the approvals and commercial production of the ELISA test kits so that they can be made available for use at the earliest. The test is named as “COVID KAVACH ELISA”. This is a perfect example of “Make in India” in record time.