Roche CEO: supply can’t meet demands for mass Covid-19 testing

Severin Schwan, CEO of Swiss pharma giant Roche, has warned that the demand for Covid-19 tests still outstrips supply, making more broad-based testing challenging. “It is very likely that vaccines will only be broadly available later next year so I expect the demand to outstrip supply for a number of months and even beyond then,” Schwan said in a briefing to the International Federation of Pharmaceutical Manufacturers & Associations (IFPMA). Since the start of the pandemic, Roche has been a major developer of tests to detect and diagnose Covid-19. It has received Emergency Use Authorization from the US authorities for its PCR diagnostic as well as antibodies tests, while it has also developed a test to differentiate between flu and Covid-19 strains. Schwan said it will be important even beyond the pandemic to use testing to distinguish between diseases showing similar symptoms, such as influenza. Targeted vs mass testing While some neighbouring countries such as Austria have...