Roche rolls out trio of PCR research tests for monkeypox

 If there’s one positive outcome of the COVID-19 pandemic, it’s the speed at which diagnostic test makers learned to develop and begin churning out kits to test for a virus.

Roche, for one, is already applying what it learned from COVID to the next infectious disease outbreak. Only a few weeks after a spate of monkeypox cases first cropped up in Europe, the company has completed development of three separate tests for the virus.

Developed in conjunction with its subsidiary TIB Molbiol, Roche’s tests are already available to scientists for research use “in the majority of countries worldwide,” the Swiss company said Wednesday.

All three of Roche’s LightMix Modular Virus test kits analyze samples using quantitative PCR technology, requiring the tests to be run on one of the company’s PCR analyzers.

The first test looks for signs of any orthopoxvirus, a strain of viruses that includes smallpox, cowpox and horsepox as well as monkeypox. Roche’s second test looks for monkeypox specifically and is able to detect both the West African and Central African clades of the virus.

The third test combines the two. Alongside identifying the presence of orthopoxviruses, it also returns results clarifying whether either form of monkeypox is the orthopoxvirus in question.

The new diagnostics initiative comes as Roche is preparing for its COVID testing revenues to dry up. Despite posting larger-than-expected returns in the first quarter of the year—about $2 billion—the company has taken a more conservative stance on its full-year forecasts, predicting a steep drop-off in COVID-related sales after the first three months of 2022.

On a broader scale, too, Roche’s trio of tests arrives not a moment too soon: In the three weeks since the first case surfaced in the U.K. in early May, more than 200 cases of monkeypox have been confirmed in a handful of regions where it’s not an endemic disease. So far, they’re mostly scattered across a handful of countries throughout Europe, North America and Australia.

Though monkeypox doesn’t generally cause severe symptoms and can be prevented with existing vaccines, the latest outbreak has so far resulted in dozens of hospitalizations, making accurate testing materials a major priority.

“Diagnostic tools are crucial for responding to and ultimately controlling emerging public health challenges as they advance response measures such as tracing efforts and treatment strategies,” said Thomas Schinecker, Ph.D., CEO of Roche Diagnostics.

https://www.fiercebiotech.com/medtech/roche-rolls-out-trio-pcr-research-tests-monkeypox