Roche, the Swiss drugmaker is not been able to meet the demand for the molecular tests for identifying active coronavirus or COVID-19 infections, the chairman told Swiss daily Tagesanzeiger.
"The demand exceeds our production," Christoph Franz was quoted in Saturday's paper. The decision on where tests were shipped to rely on the rates of infections and the availability of the diagnostic equipment.
Roche Not Able to Meet Molecular Test Demand
Demand for its antibody tests, which determine whether people have ever been infected with the coronavirus, can be met as Roche has been boosting production, he said.
The drugmaker has said that it aims to more than double the production of antibody tests to well over 100 million a month by the end of the year. Franz said that Roche had started research on a potential drug to treat COVID-19 but added that these efforts were at a very early stage.
(With agency inputs)
