RAPID COVID TEST GETS GREEN LIGHT.
OTTAWA • Health Canada has given the green light to a rapid test for COVID-19 that could be deployed to longterm care homes and schools to take pressure off provincial testing systems.
But neither the company nor the federal government will be more specific about when the test kits will start arriving other than “the coming weeks.”
The department posted news Wednesday of the approval of the Abbott Diagnostics ID Now test, which can deliver results within 13 minutes of a patient being swabbed, without having to first send the specimen to a lab for processing.
The approval came a day after Public Services and Procurement Canada signed a deal to buy nearly eight
million of the tests from the company, as well as 3,800 of the analyzer units that process the results.
“Health Canada has delivered on approvals in a rapid way,” Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said in question period.
It's not rapid enough for provinces where cases are surging and people are waiting hours in line to get tested and sometimes more than a week to get their results.
Ontario Premier Doug Ford applauded the approval Wednesday but said he wants to know when the tests will show up and when more approvals will follow.
“We would expect them to be delivered as quickly as
possible,” he said. “We don't have a moment to spare as cases continue to rise.”
The tests still need a trained health-care worker to take a swab from a patient's nose but the portable analyzer units, which weigh less than three kilograms, can be taken nearly anywhere.
They are most likely to be sent to rural and remote communities that have limited if any access to labs to test for COVID-19, or highrisk locations like schools and long-term care facilities where being able to test a lot of people quickly is effective and helpful.
They cannot be used for testing at home.