Access to COVID-19 Diagnostics

The COVID-19 pandemic has become much more than a health crisis: the combination of the humanitarian catastrophe and an economic crisis will make it dramatically harder to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals. On May 13 2020, the Swiss Federal Council approved an extraordinary credit for a global response to the COVID-19 pandemic. SDC is engaging various initiative in support to R&D and access to vaccines, diagnostics and therapeutics for LMICs. The Federal Office of Public Health focuses on securing vaccines for the Swiss population.

Current estimates indicate that 500 million tests are needed over the next 12 months in low- and middle-income countries to enable such a life-saving scenario. Providing equitable access to affordable and efficient rapid diagnostics for LMICs is a public health emergency and in line with SDC mandate.. While laboratory-based tests already exist, their use is limited. Mass testing strategies depend on simple, high-performing rapid tests, preferably that can be administered right at the point of care or even at home. The global challenge is therefore two-fold: to develop new rapid diagnostic tests and to scale up the production of such reliable, affordable tests.

Launched in early April 2020, the ACT-A Diagnostic Partnership gathers major global health actors engaged on normative and operational R&D and Access policies for medical products. FIND and the Global Fund are leading this initiative. Together with the UK (DfID), Germany and Australia, Switzerland (SDC) is one of the main and early public donors that provided political support and pledged financial commitment to this new and innovative initiative. At the bilateral level, SDC has recently engaged interventions in Myanmar and in the Horn of Africa to support local supply of molecular tests for COVID-19. This global intervention complements SDC action on access to COVID-19 diagnostics for LMICs.

Various Swiss actors are involved in this endeavor: the Geneva-based Foundation for New Innovative Diagnostics (FIND) is leading this global initiative. Lausanne University Hospital (CHUV) and UniSante are collecting samples and conducting antibody tests. Hôpitaux Universitaires de Genève (HUG) is a critical evaluation site for nucleic acid tests. The EPFL Blue Brain Project is developing an Implementation Simulator to assess diagnostics needs according to each country and context.