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WORLD NEWS Thursday 8 OcTOber 2020
Peru bet on cheap COVID antibody tests; it didn't go well

By CHRISTINE ARMARIO daily wages from informal
BOGOTA, Colombia (AP) work complicated the gov-
— In the early days of the ernment's efforts to impose
coronavirus pandemic, the a strict quarantine, further
harried health officials of challenging Peru's ability to
Peru faced a quandary. respond effectively to the
They knew molecular tests virus.
for COVID-19 were the best When Zamora arrived, he
option to detect the virus said the government had
– yet they didn't have the already decided molecu-
labs, the supplies, or the lar tests weren't a viable
technicians to make them option. The nation didn't
work. have the infrastructure
But there was a cheaper al- needed to run the tests but
ternative -- antibody tests, also acted too slowly in try-
mostly from China, that ing to obtain what little was
were flooding the market available on the market.
at a fraction of the price "Peru didn't buy in time,"
and could deliver a posi- he said. "Everyone in Latin
tive or negative result within America bought before us
minutes of a simple finger- – even Cuba."
stick. Antibody tests – which de-
In March, President Martin Indigenous Shipibo-Conibo displays for sale her artisanal goods including embroidered protec- tect proteins created by
Vizcarra took the airwaves tive face masks, in the Cantagallo neighborhood of Lima, Peru, Thursday, Sept. 24, 2020. Associ- the immune system in re-
to announce he'd signed ated Press. sponse to a virus – had nu-
off on a massive purchase merous drawbacks. They
of 1.6 million tests – almost reason why. when they did, the incred- Even now, months later, had not been widely tested
all of them for antibodies. "This was a multi-system- ible demand meant most Peru's needs are vastly un- and their accuracy was in
Now, interviews with ex- ic failure," said Dr. Víctor weren't able to secure the der met. To date, the coun- question. If taken too early,
perts, public purchase Zamora, Peru's former min- number they required. try has less than 2,000 ICU most people with the virus
orders, import records, ister of health. "We should "The collapse of global beds, compared to over test negative. That could
government resolutions, have stopped the rapid cooperation and a failure 6,000 in the state of Florida, lead those infected to
patients, and COVID-19 tests by now." of international solidarity which has 10 million fewer think they do not have CO-
health reports show that ___ have shoved Africa out of inhabitants, according to VID-19. False positives can
the country's bet on rapid As COVID-19 cases popped the diagnostics market," Dr. official data. be equally perilous, leading
antibody tests went dan- up across the globe, low- John Nkengasong, director High levels of poverty and people to incorrectly be-
gerously off course. and middle-income na- of the Africa CDC, wrote in people who depend on lieve they are immune.q
Unlike almost every other tions found themselves in a Nature magazine in April as
nation, Peru is relying heav- dilemma. the hunt was underway.
ily on rapid antibody blood The World Health Organi- Nations that got an early
tests to diagnose active zation was calling on au- jump start in preparing
cases – a purpose for which thorities to ramp up testing or had a relatively robust
they are not designed. The to prevent the virus from health care system al-
tests cannot detect early spreading out of control. ready in place fared best.
COVID-19 infections, mak- One particular test – a Two weeks after Colombia
ing it hard to quickly iden- polymerase chain reac- identified its first case, the
tify and isolate the sick. Epi- tion exam – was deemed country had 22 private and
demiologists interviewed the best option. Using a public laboratories signed
by The Associated Press say specimen collected from up to do PCR testing. Peru,
their misuse is producing a deep in the nose, the test is by contrast, relied on just
sizable number of false pos- developed on specialized one laboratory capable of
itives and negatives, help- machines that can detect 200 tests a day.
ing fuel one of the world's the genetic material of the For years, Peru has invested
worst COVID-19 outbreaks. virus within days of infec- a smaller part of its GDP on
What's more, a number tion. public health than others
of the antibody tests pur- If COVID-19 cases are in the region. As COVID-19
chased for use in Peru have caught early, the sick can approached, glaring de-
since been rejected by be isolated, their contacts ficiencies in Peru became
the United States after in- traced, and the chain of evident. There were just
dependent analysis found contagion severed. 100 ICU beds available for
they did not meet stan- Within weeks of the initial COVID-19 patients, said Dr.
dards for accurately de- outbreak in China, genome Víctor Zamora, who was
tecting COVID-19. sequences for the virus appointed to lead Peru's
Today the South American were made available and Ministry of Health in March.
nation has the highest per specialists in Asia and Eu- Corruption scandals had
capita COVID-19 mortality rope got to work creating left numerous hospital con-
rate of any country across their own tests. But in parts struction projects on pause.
the globe, according to of the world like Africa and Peru also faced a signifi-
John Hopkins University – Latin America, there was cant shortage of doctors,
and physicians there be- no such option. They would forcing the state to embark
lieve the country's faulty have to wait for the tests to on a massive hiring cam-
testing approach is one become available – and paign.