BENGALURU: After much waiting, the government of India has finally decided to involve private laboratories in the process of genome sequencing. The Indian SARS-CoV-2 Genomic Consortia (INSACOG), established for genomic surveillance in the country in January, has announced that private labs will be allowed to detect new coronavirus variants, so as to significantly scale up genomic surveillance in the country. 

According to a statement by INSACOG, based on interest expressed by some private sector laboratories, a meeting was organised with the labs, after which it was decided to have a standard operating procedure for involvement of private labs which intend to get involved in the process of genome sequencing.

The main players who were part of the meeting were representatives of Mahajan Imaging Private Limited, New  Delhi; Strands Life Sciences, Bengaluru; Genotypic Technology Private Limited, Bengaluru; NMC Genetics India Pvt Ltd, Gurgaon; MapmyGenome India Limited, Hyderabad, and Premas Life Sciences, New Delhi.