Hungary bought coronavirus tests that China later banned from exporting because their quality is too bad

Two Chinese companies delivered coronavirus tests to Hungary, but it came to light that their product is unable to detect the infection.

According to Direkt36, there are more than 3 million people in the world who have been infected with the COVID-19 virus, and 200 thousand of them died because of the epidemic. Moreover, the economic effects of the coronavirus are hard even to appraise at the moment. In the fight against the spread of the virus, it is vital to screen as many people as possible, and for that, many tests have been made, but with varying accuracy. 

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The Hungarian state signed a contract with Chinese Hybribio Biotech about buying coronavirus tests in March. However, since China tightened the export rules of such products, the company could not deliver its tests abroad. 

In the last few weeks, many countries complained that they received very low-quality goods from Chinese companies, and that is why

local authorities modified the export rules of the protection kits.

The new instructions say that only those companies can deliver such products abroad that are on the list of the National Medical Product Administration (NMPA). Later, they changed even those regulations, saying that those companies that are not on NMPA’s list but have the necessary documents and foreign permissions can export protective kits. The names of those were put on another list.

The above-mentioned Hybribio is currently not on any of the two lists. Moreover, two rapid tests used by the Hungarian ambulance, products of the Anhui Deep Deep Blue Medical Technology and the Hangzhou Clongene Biotech companies, are also not on the list of the NMPA. However, they have CE permission allowing them to export their goods to the European Union, but based on some studies published late April, the tests are unable to detect the infection. Interestingly, the Online Community of the Hungarian House Doctors has recently published a statement in which

they demanded the suspension of unreliable rapid tests.

Cecília Müller, the chief medical officer of Hungary, said about the rapid tests in March that their quality was very different. Therefore, 444, a Hungarian news outlet, asked the Operative Body how many rapid tests had arrived in Hungary from companies that cannot export their products from April because of the new Chinese regulation. Moreover, they wanted to know how many contracts had been signed after the new export rules were implemented in China, but they have not received an answer as of yet. 

Source: hvg.hu