NIH’s ‘Shark Tank’ Pours $249 Million Into Speedy Covid Tests (1)

Quidel and six other companies that produce rapid Covid-19 tests will receive $248.7 million in NIH grants to ramp up manufacturing.

The Department of Health and Human Services has already tapped Quidel tests for nursing homes because they give results in 15 minutes. Other winners include point-of-care test manufacturers Mesa Biotech and Talis Biomedical and lab-based test manufacturers Ginkgo Bioworks, Helix OpCo, Fluidigm, and Mammoth Biosciences.

“These innovations will significantly increase the number, type, and availability of tests by millions per week as early as September 2020,” Francis Collins, director of the National Institutes of Health, told reporters this morning. ...