The Drugs Controller General of India, the Indian Council of Medical Research, and the national TB expert committee have approved the country’s first indigenous testing kit for tuberculosis. The kit, called PathoDetect™, is manufactured by Pune-based Mylab.
What should you know? FIT tells you.
Literally, Make in India: So far, India has been using imported test kits from the United States and Europe. However, the new RT-PCR-based testing kit developed by Mylab also “detects drug resistance” to Rifampicin and Isoniazid, which are the two most commonly used drugs for TB treatment.
Why does it matter? TB is a public health concern in our country. 19.3 lakh TB cases were reported in India last year. In 2020, 4.93 lakh people died due to TB.