On October 13, the Department of Defense (DOD), on behalf of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), awarded an Other Transaction Agreement to Cue Health Inc., San Diego, California, to expand U.S. production capacity of point-of-care COVID-19 tests.
This industrial base expansion effort will allow Cue Health to increase production to 100,000 COVID-19 test kits per day by March 2021, and demonstrate this capacity through the delivery of six million COVID-19 tests to the U.S. Government to support the domestic COVID-19 response. The Cue COVID-19 Test is a molecular test that detects the ribonucleic acid (RNA) of SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, in about 20 minutes using a nasal swab sample taken from the lower part of the nose using the Cue Sample Wand.
Cue’s COVID-19 Test runs on the compact and portable Cue Health Monitoring System and a single-use COVID-19 test kit includes a COVID-19 Test Cartridge and a Cue Sample Wand. The system can be used for analysis of nasal specimens at the point of care and transmits test results to the Cue Health App on a connected mobile smart device. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration Emergency Use Authorization allows the Cue COVID-19 Test to be used in patient care settings under the supervision of qualified medical personnel.
This effort is being led by the DOD’s Joint Program Executive Office for Chemical, Biological, Radiological and Nuclear Defense (JPEO-CBRND), in coordination with the DOD Defense Assisted Acquisition Cell (DA2) and funded through the HHS Office of the Assistant Secretary for Health to enable and support domestic production of critical medical resources.