Microbix & Oneworld Create COVID-19 Test Quality Program

MISSISSAUGA, Ontario and VANCOUVER, British Columbia, April 09, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — Microbix Biosystems Inc. (TSX: MBX, Microbix^®) and Oneworld Accuracy (1WA) announce a strategic collaboration to provide a global external quality assessment (EQA) program to support clinically-effective COVID-19 testing. Based in Canada, this program will be made available to all governments to underpin their public health responsibility to ensure accurate and reliable COVID-19 testing. In every country and more than ever, political leadership, medical professionals, and the public need to have confidence in patient test results.

This EQA program will first be launched in Canada then, as production scales, be rolled-out worldwide – likely over the next few months. Details are available online at www.microbix.com and www.1wa.org.

Microbix will provide all EQA samples for this global program, including its SARS-CoV-2 quality assessment products (QAPs™), branded as REDx™FLOQ^® SARS-CoV-2 on COPAN^® FLOQSwabs^®, and as REDx™ Controls in liquid format. The SARS-CoV-2 QAPs provide whole-genome workflow support that includes 100% of viral genetic sequences and emulate real patient samples while being consistent, non-infectious, and stable. As such, they contain all possible nucleic-acid test (NAT) viral targets, ensuring compatibility across current and future NATs. The SARS-CoV-2 QAPs are representative of Microbix’s established catalogue of QAPs of viral and bacterial respiratory pathogens, which have years of successful global usage and are demonstrated to work across more than 20 different widely-used test formats.

Cameron Groome, CEO of Microbix commented, “This collaboration combines Microbix’s demonstrated expertise in making innovative and cross-platform EQA samples with 1WA’s leading EQA informatics and logistics expertise. 1WA’s collaborative model provides this new EQA program access to more than sixty participating governments. Alongside 1WA, we’re pleased to be able to enable a global EQA program and make a significant public health contribution to fighting the COVID-19 pandemic.”

1WA will manage all informatics and logistics for this global EQA program for the current network of governments that have adopted collaborative EQA, and for further governments that need EQA to underpin the quality of their COVID-19 testing efforts.

Daniel Taylor, CEO of 1WA also commented, “We have already begun to assemble an international scientific advisory board to optimize the design of this vital program and analyze the resulting data sets. We believe the program and its scientific advisory board will uniquely support public health responses to the COVID-19 pandemic. In particular, the program can be readily implemented in low- and middle-income countries where COVID-19 may have a disproportionate impact. Participating governments can be made fully operational as national EQA providers with a few days by way of online training.”

About Microbix (MBX)
Microbix develops proprietary biological and technology solutions for human health and well-being, with approximately 80 skilled employees and sales now usually exceeding $1 million per month on average. It makes a wide range of critical biological materials for the global diagnostics industry, notably antigens for immunoassays and its laboratory quality assessment products (QAPs™) that support clinical lab proficiency testing, enable assay development and validation, or help ensure quality control of clinical diagnostic tests. Microbix antigens and QAPs are sold to many customers worldwide, at present primarily to multinational diagnostics companies and laboratory accreditation organizations. Microbix is certified to ISO 9001:2015, ISO 13485:2016, and operates under U.S. FDA Establishment Registration #3007652384.