MORGANTOWN, W.Va. — CARES Act money from the state and work by West Virginia University and the state Department of Health and Human Resources has been used to vastly increase testing capacity in the state. A new COVID-19 testing lab is now operating at the Health Sciences Center on the WVU campus.
“I cannot thank Gov. Justice enough for his vision and leadership on this vital component in our continued battle against the coronavirus,” WVU President Gordon Gee said. “By directing CARES Act funding to make this lab a reality, we will be able to facilitate better health outcomes for thousands of West Virginians.”
According to Dr. Peter Perrotta, chair of Pathology, Anatomy and Laboratory Medicine at WVU and founding director of the WVURDL, the WVU Rapid Development Laboratory can process hundreds of tests per day, relieving a system that has been overloaded.
“I think everyone knows we’re in the midst of a resurgence in the state and this has led to the need for more and more testing,” Perrotta said. “This laboratory is helping to meet that demand.”
From the beginning of the pandemic, hospitals and clinics have struggled with tests and have had to send some samples out of state for analysis, increasing the turnaround time for results.
“We’ve now implements this automated robotic system. These are highly capable instruments that can process large numbers of samples at a time,” Perrotta said.
The work done by the WVURDL is reducing wait times for the most accurate PCR test and reallocating the volume testing work that is required as more testing is completed.
“By being able to perform more tests in the state quickly, that also has the added benefit now that other laboratories say in Charleston are able to turnaround their tests faster,” Perrotta said.
Still, the turnaround time is not comparable to the antigen method that can provide results in minutes, but the wait time is reduced for the much more accurate PCR test.
“We use the most sensitive test we have available,” Perrotta said. “But, at the same time recognizing we need to get the test results quickly so we can move on to contract tracing and such to reduce the spread.”
Perrotta said they were able to provide those results in less than 24 hours.
“Right now, some labs are two or three days behind. At high-demand times, it can take up to a week to 10 days to get results. That’s not particularly helpful if it takes that long,” he said.
“Aggressive testing of West Virginia citizens is a cornerstone of our strategy for controlling COVID-19 spread in the state,” said Dr. Clay Marsh, WVU Health Sciences vice president and executive dean and coronavirus czar for West Virginia. “To control spread, we need to identify the five to 10 percent of people that spread COVID-19 to 80 percent of others. The best investment in safe schools for teachers, staff and students is controlling the rate of COVID-19 spread in each community. The WVURDL is an example of leveraging the talent of research-focused land-grant universities addressing critical problems of states and allows West Virginia to greatly expand testing capacity.”
The research team, comprised of doctorate-level faculty and technical staff who are virology experts, was led by Dr. Laura Gibson, senior associate vice president of WVU Health Sciences Office for Research and Graduate Education. Gibson was instrumental in finding laboratory space at the Health Sciences for the WVURDL and coordinating all of the research activities related to COVID-19.
The lab is logistically supported by the WVU team of researchers. The Innovation Hub uses their 3-D printing capability to produce swabs and viral media is now produced on the WVU campus as well.