30 April 2021
Unilabs breaks the ten million Covid-19 test mark
Geneva, 26 April 2021: Unilabs, the leading European diagnostic group, has hit a key milestone in its fight against Covid-19, passing the 10 million Covid-19 test mark.
“Since December last year, we have doubled our Covid-19 test volumes – a remarkable achievement for our front-line teams across our seventeen countries,” said Dr Christian Rebhan, Unilabs’ Chief Medical and Operations Officer. “As the vaccines are rolled out and the world prepares to open up again, testing remains crucial to quickly identifying and containing the virus wherever it turns up.”
“Our teams have put their heart and soul into delivering this success, working tirelessly to ramp up capacity, secure supplies, take samples from our patients, and deliver accurate results as quickly as possible,” said Timóteo Guimarães, who runs Unilabs' Covid-19 business unit.
Since the start of the pandemic, Unilabs has hugely increased both sampling and testing capacity. Equipped with state-of-the-art technology, and with dedicated new labs in Portugal, the Netherlands, UK and the UAE, current capacity at Unilabs exceeds 500,000 tests per week and rising.
The bulk of the tests are PCR tests. Unilabs also offers rapid antigen tests, as well as serology tests, which provide insight into the level of antibodies in a patient’s bloodstream, and thus the patients’ immune response to the virus. Demand for serology tests is rising as more people get vaccinated, since these tests can evaluate the patient’s individual reaction to the vaccine.
Unilabs has also introduced innovative new techniques and technologies to improve, speed up, and broaden testing. This includes tests that specifically identify variants such as the UK or South African variant, as well as new kinds of tests such as saliva or gargling tests.
To minimise risks for patients and staff, Unilabs has also created innovative workflows, setting up more than two hundred drive- and walk-throughs. Unilabs also carries out some Covid-19 sampling at its roughly 1,000 regular collection centres. At the same time, it has introduced dedicated zones to allow vulnerable non-Covid patients – such as the elderly and the immuno-suppressed – to continue routine testing for other conditions.
Media contact:
Alistair Hammond, Director of Communications
e: Alistair.Hammond@unilabs.com
t: +44 771 773 0441
Unilabs is one of Europe’s largest diagnostics companies. It offers a complete range of laboratory, pathology and imaging services for patients all around the world. With 12,700 employees across 150 imaging centres and 250 labs in 17 countries, we perform more than four million lab tests a week – saving lives every single day.