Throughout the pandemic, WHO reference laboratories have played a vital role in the confirmation of COVID-19 cases. They are mainly used when countries do not have the capacity to do all the testing they need themselves and when experience of testing for the virus is limited.
Since March 2020, hundreds of samples have been sent from Member States across the WHO European Region to laboratories based in Berlin, London, Paris, Rotterdam and Bilthoven (the Netherlands), Koltsovo (Russian Federation) and Geneva, where they are sequenced to confirm positive COVID-19 diagnoses, or resolve so-called “false negatives” – where presence of the virus has not been confirmed through polymerase chain reaction (PCR) testing of sick patients.
In addition, laboratory experts from WHO/Europe and reference laboratories have delivered both on-site and online sequencing training to health professionals in Azerbaijan, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kyrgyzstan, North Macedonia and Serbia.
“Many of the submitting labs needed our help to resolve urgent public health questions. Others used our input to build or validate their own diagnostic setup,” explained Christian Drosten, who leads the reference laboratory in Berlin.