Illumina lowers access barriers to pathogen surveillance
Discounted prices and multipathogen monitoring could help reshape public health in lower- and middle-income countries
If COVID taught us anything, it’s that pathogens don’t respect borders and everyone on planet Earth could benefit from broadening the number of regions capable of pathogen surveillance. Illumina’s Global Health Access Initiative aims to make it easier and cheaper for lower- and middle-income countries to participate in that surveillance, while growing the company’s presence in regions that could become more lucrative markets in the long term.
Vanessa Moeder, head of global health at Illumina Inc. (NASDAQ:ILMN), told BioCentury that the cost of equipment and materials is not the only reason lower- and middle-income countries lack access. In these regions, large global funds tend to be the organizations that purchase and distribute expensive medical technologies, but doing so is logistically difficult when pricing and distribution vary widely from region to region. ...