Quidel Corporation applauds Biden plan to expand COVID testing

Quidel Corporation today announced its support for the Biden Administration’s plan to expand COVID-19 testing in schools, underserved communities, rural areas and other settings that have been gravely impacted by the pandemic.

“Quidel applauds the Biden Administration’s urgent and comprehensive approach to bringing the benefits of rapid, routine and equitable coronavirus testing to America’s classrooms, underserved communities and rural areas,” said Douglas Bryant, president and CEO of Quidel Corporation. “Frequent testing has proven to be a critical tool for both empowering people to take charge of their own health and allowing large institutions, businesses, sports and entertainment venues and enumerable other aspects of society to reopen safely and remain so.”

“Our mission at Quidel has always been to democratize access to frequent, affordable and highly accurate COVID-19 testing, and we expect the Administration’s American Rescue Plan for testing will turbocharge efforts all across the diagnostics industry to get everyone screened so the virus and any variants can be stopped, tracked and traced in real time,” Mr. Bryant noted. “We are approaching the inflection point where frequent at-home, in-school and on-site testing of asymptomatic people at scale can give us greater peace of mind to see our families, dine out and travel.”

Quidel recently received Emergency Use Authorization (EUA) from the FDA for its QuickVue® At-Home COVID-19 Test, an easy-to-use test that provides results to symptomatic patients in ten minutes with a doctor’s prescription. The company is seeking an EUA for over-the-counter (OTC) sale of the QuickVue® At-Home COVID-19 Test to symptomatic and asymptomatic consumers without a prescription. Quidel is currently building out a new manufacturing facility in Carlsbad, CA dedicated to the production of Quidel’s popular QuickVue® line of products. The 128,000 square foot facility will be the company’s highest-volume production plant in the world and is expected to produce 600 million QuickVue® rapid antigen tests for the detection and diagnosis of COVID-19 infections. MB Bureau