Newport Lighthouse Lab begins processing COVID-19 tests

PerkinElmer has announced that the first Turnkey Lighthouse lab in Newport, South Wales, is now processing COVID-19 testing samples as part of the company’s collaboration with the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) in support of the UK government’s Test and Trace strategy.

The Newport lab is the first facility to be brought online by PerkinElmer with the DHSC. DHSC and PerkinElmer are collaborating to create an additional testing facility at Charnwood in Leicestershire as well as supplying testing capabilities, equipment and reagents to NHS Trusts across the UK.

The Newport facility began processing its first samples on Monday 5th October and is expected to deliver up to 20,000 samples daily by the end of October with PerkinElmer’s SARS-CoV-2 RT-PCR kits and workflow solutions. The Charnwood lab is expected to be in operation by the end of November and will be able to process up to 50,000 tests daily upon reaching full capacity in January 2021.

Miles Burrows, managing director, UK & Ireland, PerkinElmer, said: “It is imperative to have a dedicated testing strategy that rapidly identifies individuals carrying the virus, and we’re pleased to have the Newport facility to help fulfil this mission. Our best-in-class technologies combined with our turnkey approach are ideally suited to align with DHSC’s desire to ramp up testing. Laboratories across the UK will be able to maintain maximum capacity, while also being able to quickly respond to evolving public health needs.”

DHSC laboratories are processing more than one million COVID-19 tests a week as new facilities and technologies enable faster processing.

PerkinElmer is utilising its chemagic 360 instruments and Janus G3 PCR+ Workstations in these UK labs to automate PerkinElmer’s RNA extraction and RT-PCR tests. This total workflow solution enables rapid sample processing at higher volumes, helping to decrease turnaround time. PerkinElmer’s OneSource services and PerkinElmer Genomics operations enable this turnkey approach to provide sample testing in order to meet the government’s immediate and future COVID-19 testing requirements.