Manila acquires new COVID-19 test machine

The new center will be the fourth COVID-19 test center in Manila, which is open for residents and non-residents alike

The City of Manila continues with its campaign to provide Manileños with opportunities to avail of free COVID-19 tests with the purchase of another machine intended for use at the Justice Abad Santos General Hospital (JASGEN).

Mayor Francisco “Isko Moreno” Domagoso said the new machine will be used for the hospital’s walk-in clients.

A date for the center’s opening has yet to be announced.

The new center will be the fourth COVID-19 test center in Manila, which is open for residents and non-residents alike.

The new machine, an Architect i2000 SR, can handle double the load from an earlier model. This will allow health workers to test more individuals in the quickest possible time.

The mayor said the machine, manufactured by Abbott Laboratories, offers nothing less than 100 percent sensitivity and 99.6 percent specificity, thus doing away with “false negative” and “false positive” results common among rapid test kits.

He explained the results of the SR machines are far more accurate than ordinary rapid test kits and are as reliable as the results offered by the polymerase chain reaction or PCR machines used in confirmatory swab tests.

Domagoso, along with Vice Mayor Honey Lacuna, personally visited JASGEN yesterday to check on the newly-arrived machine.

The purchase is in line with the mayor’s earlier pledge to set up a walk-in COVID test center at the hospital, following the opening last Monday of a similar facility at the Ospital ng Sampaloc.

The Manila Infectious Disease Control Center, located at the Ospital ng Sta. Ana, which serves as the city’s COVID-19 center, uses a PCR machine. It is also the city’s first COVID testing laboratory, built with the approval and assistance of the national government, specifically the Department of Health.

The walk-in COVID test centers were conceptualized for the benefit those who have no vehicles.