This archive report was first published on 3 July 2020.
Published on July 3, 2020, a controversy surrounding Pathologists Lancet Kenya's COVID-19 testing has come to the fore after two women received conflicting results from different labs.
According to Dr. Ahmed Kalebi, the East Africa CEO of Lancet, the facility has been audited by three government institutions and has conducted quality control checks on all its tests.
Dr. Kalebi attributed the discrepancies in test results to differences in the concentration of material in the sample tested, the sensitivity of the assays used, and the technical quality processes in the laboratory.
He insisted that the Sars-CoV-2 PCR tests done at a cost of Sh8,849 are 100 percent sensitive and specific, and that the facility has undergone international external quality assurance (EQA) for COVID-19 to verify the accuracy of its testing.
"We do appreciate the concerns raised by such discordance in results, which we've tried to explain scientifically through newsletters to our esteemed clients, medical colleagues taking care of them and the general public," Dr. Kalebi said in a Facebook post.
He added that the facility has shared independent research studies and evaluations which have demonstrated that positive test results from the Seegene Allplex assay can be missed by other assays, particularly for cases with low viral loads.
Dr. Kalebi's comments come after Kiambu Central MP Jude Njomo testified before the Senate Health Committee that his late mother had tested negative for COVID-19, only to be told by the Health ministry that she was positive.
