The Ministry of Health has acquired new high-tech equipment that will assist its referral laboratory to more than double the number of polymerase chain reaction (PCR) Covid-19 tests done per day.

Donated by the Japanese government through the WHO and officially handed over to the Ministry of Health on Wednesday, June 2, the new PCR machines do automated extraction of the DNA of the Covid-19 virus, and thus increase the speed at which the tests are done.

Speaking at the handover ceremony, Dr. Daniel Ngamije, the Minister of Health, said that with the new equipment, medics will be capable of doing at least 3,000 PCR tests per day, as opposed to the 1,000 that they currently do.

"The equipment is made with advanced technology that enables us to do PCR tests in a faster way. With this, we can increase the number of people we can test per day,” he said.

He added that it supports government’s plans of continuing to cut the time that people spend waiting for PCR test results,

"In the past, we used to release PCR results after 24 hours. But in the previous days, we cut the time to 8 hours, and now we want to continue in that direction so that we can be able to provide results between 4 to 6 hours after doing the PCR test,” he said.

The machines cost $150,000 (Rwf150 million).

Masahiro Imai, the Ambassador of Japan to Rwanda said the support is aimed at realizing high-level test results and strengthening Rwanda’s national response to the Covid-19 pandemic.

"We sincerely appreciate the consistent efforts and firm commitment of the government of Rwanda in responding effectively to this worldwide crisis caused by the Covid-19 pandemic, and sincerely hope these PCR machines will contribute to assisting their efforts and dedication,” he said.