The Philippine Red Cross Logistics Multipurpose Center (PLMC) molecular laboratory underwent a multistage process for Covid-19 lab assessment and received a five-star rating from the Research Institute for Tropical Medicine (RITM) on December 13, 2021.
Philippine Red Cross (PRC) Chairman and CEO Senator Richard Gordon revealed this development to media and said that as the National Reference Laboratory for emerging and re-emerging infectious diseases, the RITM regularly conducts proficiency testing to ensure and maintain the high-quality performance of independent laboratories.
At the start of the pandemic, when the RITM conducted only 300 tests a day, Gordon said he envisioned to establish molecular laboratories nationwide to ramp up the country’s national testing output.
The PLMC molecular laboratory started operating last April 25, 2020, and is capable of testing 4,000 tests daily. Since then, thirteen more molecular laboratories have been established throughout the archipelago with a total testing capacity of 60,000 a day.
The PRC is foremost agency in the Covid-19 testing initiative with over five million tests, while the next organization has done only over a million.
“We have surpassed the five million mark in Covid-19 testing and we will not stop. We test to save lives! Covid-19 testing is very important because, through this, we would know who has been infected. Through immediate testing, we could isolate positive individuals to prevent them from infecting others,” Gordon said.
To date, PRC has conducted over 5,056,996 tests nationwide, 899,119 of which are from the PLMC molecular laboratory.
Gordon also encourages everyone to undergo regular tests to help ensure the safety of the people around them.