Stratasys (NSDQ:SSYS) and Origin announced that they signed an agreement to produce more than 1 million nasopharyngeal COVID-19 testing swabs per week.
Under the agreement, Stratasys is slated to market and promote Origin’s 3D-printed swabs to healthcare providers and other U.S. testing centers. Each Origin One 3D printer can produce batches of 1,500 Origin NP O1 swabs at a time and multiple times daily. Origin intends to introduce a streamlined process to produce approximately 190,000 swabs per day, totaling 1.3 million per week.
A clinical trial at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, associated with Harvard Medical School, revealed that Origin swabs recorded the strongest performance when compared to two other 3D-printed swabs.
According to a news release, Stratasys has been leading a coalition to provide 3D-printed face shields to nearly 100 front-line organizations during the COVID-19 pandemic, having already provided about 40,000 shields at no cost to health systems.
“We believe widespread testing can help save lives and get our economy going again, and we’re confident that our Origin One technology and simple material requirements will be able to produce millions of swabs to meet the need,” Origin CEO Christopher Prucha said in the release. “We’ve been impressed by the speed with which Stratasys has been able to provide thousands of shields to healthcare systems across the country and believe they are the right partner for helping get millions of swabs where they are most needed.”
