Mrunal Manmay Dash

With Covid cases, particularly the Omicron variant, witnessing a rise in the State, the Odisha government has placed an order to procure five lakh Omicron testing kits, OmiSure, informed Girish Krishnamurthy, CEO and Managing Director of Tata Medical and Diagnostics Ltd. (TATA MD) on Monday.

‘OmiSure’ test kits have been developed by TATA MD in collaboration with the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR).

In a release, the TATA MD said, “The government of Odisha is the first state in the country to order the TATA MD CHECK OmiSure RT- PCR tests developed in partnership with ICMR for detection of the Omicron variant of COVID.”

As OmiSure specifically identifies Omicron without the need for sequencing, it will help the government to combat the spread of the new variant of concern in the state, the release said.

Thanking the State government, Gurumurthy said, “OmiSure is the only test kit that can specifically detect the Omicron variant at the point of testing. We would like to thank the Government of Odisha, the first state in the country that has decided to use TATA MD OmiSure for COV19 testing and would provide all necessary support."

As per reports, TATA MD CHECK RT-PCR, OmiSure is the only test kit approved by the ICMR for RT-PCR detection of the Omicron variant. It targets 3 genes with a single tube, fully multiplexed assay in a unique design that identifies simultaneous S-gene Target Failure (SGTF) and S-Gene Mutation Amplification (SGMA).

Its confirmatory evaluation of RdRP target with internal controls leads to accurate diagnosis with significant reduction in the risk of false-positive reactions from contamination in control materials. OmiSure uses the standard qPCR workflow, compatible with commonly used qPCR platforms with 4+ channels, the press release further said.

It is pertinent to mention here that the total number of Omicron infection in Odisha reached 103 after detection of 28 new cases on Monday as informed by the Institute of Life Sciences (ILS), Bhubaneswar.

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