Enterprise businesses are scrambling across the country to keep their employees working and protect their bottom lines. Many have invested in better mobile accessories to allow their employees to work from home. However, most are hoping the end of the pandemic comes sooner rather than later. For many enterprise organizations, the logistics of having employees work from home are too complicated to keep up long-term. This is especially true for those running supply chain businesses, whose businesses help deliver food and supplies across the country.
There has been a lot of discussion about when the U.S. workforce can return to the job, and how to do it safely. Laboratories and companies across the world are scrambling to help find a way to make that happen with innovative solutions.
Scanwell Health, a Los Angeles based digital healthcare company, may help pave the way. Their test is done at home, using a test kit and smartphone. The user orders the test, which arrives in the mail. They prick their finger and place a drop of blood on a test cassette. The user scans a picture of the blood test and sends via phone to a lab, which lets him or her know within a couple hours whether they have the antibodies for covid 19. Antibodies mean that the person has already been exposed to the coronavirus and cannot be re-infected, making it possible for them to return to work.
Although this test can’t diagnose people who are currently sick, it can go a long way toward giving employees and their employers the information they need to reopen an office location – and who is safe to staff it.
The test has yet to be approved for use within the U.S. However, it has been approved by the Chinese version of the Food and Drug Administration and is already being used in China, Iran and the Czech Republic.
Scanwell Health is the developer of a similar at-home test to identify urinary tract infections, already approved by the FDA.