TEHRAN,Iran, March.28
Trend:
Iran has developed coronavirus testing kits and a mass production will be launched once the kits undergo special confirmation, said the spokesman for Iran's National Headquarters of Fighting Coronavirus Kianoush Jahanpour, Trend reports via IRNA.
He said that the mass production of testing kits would be more than 80,000 per week, although the kits would only be used for tracking the spread of the disease during the epidemic.
Jahanpour pointed out that in the current situation medical examinations and lung scans would be more reliable for diagnosis of patients.
"In some cases it may be possible that a patient is coronavirus-positive, but tests negative, so its better to depend on CT scan and medical examination," he said.
The outbreak in the Chinese city of Wuhan - which is an international transport hub - began at a fish market in late December 2019. The number of people killed by the disease has surpassed 27,300. Over 597,000 people have been confirmed as infected. Meanwhile, over 131,700 people have reportedly recovered.
Some sources claim the coronavirus outbreak started as early as November 2019. Several countries are working on a vaccine against the new virus.
The World Health Organization (WHO) on March 11 declared COVID-19 a pandemic.
Iran is one of the countries heavily affected by the rapidly-spreading coronavirus. According to recent reports from the Iranian officials, over 32,300 people have been infected, 2,378 people have already died. Meanwhile, over 11,000 have reportedly recovered from the disease.
The country continues to apply strict measures to contain the further spread. Reportedly, the disease was brought to Iran by a businessman from Iran's Qom city, who went on a business trip to China, despite official warnings. The man died later from the disease.
The Islamic Republic only announced its first infections and deaths from the coronavirus on Feb. 19.