ICMR Approves ‘COVIRAP’, Low-Cost COVID-19 Testing Device Developed By IIT Kharagpur

New Delhi: COVIRAP, the low-cost portable COVID-19 testing device developed by the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Kharagpur has received certification from the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR). After rigorous testing with patient samples by an authorized ICMR laboratory, adhering to their strict guidelines, ICMR has now granted certification for this Covid-19 Diagnostic Test.

A team of researchers at the Indian Institute of Technology in Kharagpur has developed this cuboid-shaped portable testing device COVIRAP for rapid diagnostics of coronavirus, which produces results in under an hour.

Each test requires a kit, three master-mixes which are made by the team. After several steps of mixing and heating, an image of the testing strips is grabbed by a smartphone camera of a custom-made mobile application, and a definite result is produced.
“This innovation has made high-quality and accurate Covid testing affordable for the common people with a testing cost of around Rs 500 which can further be reduced through government intervention,” said Ramesh Pokhriyal Nishank, Union education minister.

“This machine can be developed at a cost of less than Rs 10,000 with minimal infrastructural requirement making the technology affordable to common people. The testing process in this new machine is completed within one hour,” Nishank added.