The National Institutes of Health today announced six new contracts worth $98.35 million for COVID-19 testing approaches that provide new modes of sample collection, processing and return of results.
NIH awarded the contracts in collaboration with the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA) as part of the Rapid Acceleration of Diagnostics (RADx) initiative. They cover innovations including integration with smart devices, mobile-lab processing that can be deployed to COVID-19 hot spots, and test results available within minutes.
“Since launching in April, the NIH RADx initiative has moved swiftly to facilitate critical expansion of early and late-stage testing technologies as well as research to remove barriers to testing for underserved and vulnerable populations,” NIH Director Dr. Francis S. Collins said in a news release. “Each of the technologies emerging from the RADx initiative will play a critical role in extending accessibility to testing in diverse settings.”