ISLAMABAD: Pakistan has developed indigenous COVID-19 diagnostic kits that have been approved by Drug Regulatory Authority of Pakistan for commercial use.

In an interview with Arab News, Federal Minister for Science and Technology Chaudhry Fawad Hussain said the locally manufactured diagnostic kits would considerably bring down the cost of coronavirus tests in the country.

He said the kit was developed by experts at the National University of Science and Technology with more than 90 percent accuracy, which is about 20 percent better than the imported tests.

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The minister also expressed the hope that domestic ventilators would also be prepared within next few weeks, since clinical trials of four machines have already entered their final phase.

He said once these trials are over, the commercial entities would be asked to start manufacturing the ventilators.