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Kyrgyzstan to get new equipment for COVID-19 testing

The United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) will provide Kyrgyzstan with equipment that allows to carry out 80,000 more tests for COVID-19 per month. The US Embassy in the Kyrgyz Republic reports.

Delivery of laboratory supplies and equipment for $652,000 to healthcare facilities in Bishkek, Naryn, and Osh cities and At-Bashy district of the Kyrgyz Republic already began. The donated supplies will be used to conduct tests for COVID-19.

This contribution is expected to raise the Kyrgyz Republic’s COVID-19 testing capability by 2,700 tests per day.

«This is a long-term investment,» said CDC Central Asia Director Dr. Daniel Singer. «The donated equipment will not only help the country fight the current pandemic but will keep helping it to fight the spread of other infectious diseases in the future.» The equipment delivery includes ten cutting edge PCR Thermal Cyclers, at a total value of more than $300,000 which can utilize a wide range of different test systems produced by third party manufacturers, significantly increasing the Kyrgyz Republic’s COVID-19 testing capacity.

This latest donation is part of the $1.38 million worth of support pledged by CDC to support the Kyrgyz Republic in combating the COVID-19 epidemic. From high capacity oxygen concentrators to cutting edge epidemiological analysis software, the United States is providing more than $5 million USD in support from USAID, CDC and the U.S. State Department.

CDC Central Asia has been supporting the ministries of health in Central Asia since the beginning of the outbreak by organizing trainings and providing technical assistance on emergency operations, laboratory operations, infection prevention and control, screening at ports of entry, risk communication and community engagement, and disease surveillance.

This year CDC/Central Asia is celebrating its 25th anniversary. The first CDC office in the region was opened in 1995 in Almaty. Today, the agency has staff stationed in Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, and Tajikistan supporting those countries’ ministries of health to train health workers, strengthen their health systems, and respond to COVID-19, HIV, tuberculosis, and other infectious disease epidemics.

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