Rabat – Moroccan startup Moldiag has launched the first 100% Moroccan diagnostic test for Hepatitis C, with the group of young scientists responsible for the invention announcing on Saturday that the test will mainly allow early detection of the disease and protect a “large part of the population.”
The young scientists took part in a meeting the Moroccan Foundation for Advanced Science Innovation and Research (MAScIR) organized to discuss ways to curb Hepatitis C in Africa.
According to the group of scientists from the Moldiag startup, the Moroccan diagnostic respects the best international standards and has a high degree of efficiency and precision at controlled costs.
The invention seeks to contribute to health security in Morocco and to provide practitioners and therapists with a rapid, efficient, and accessible means to more effectively deal with the conditions of Hepatitis C patients, they said.
Mustapha Benazzouz, Hepatitis gastroenterologist and former professor at the Medicine Faculty in Rabat said that the launch, production, and marketing of the molecular diagnostic test for hepatitis C constitutes a notable boost in the field of advanced biotechnological industry in Morocco.
Over 70 million people are infected with Hepatitis C across the world, including 10 million in Africa.
Only 5% of people affected on the African continent are aware of their health status, while the rest of the ill population is at great risk of developing cirrhosis or hepatocarcinoma, the professor said.
The rapid test will seek to treat patients and save many lives before the onset of complications.
“Hepatitis C treatments are effective and available, especially since they are made in Morocco at affordable prices,” the professor said.
Abdeladim Moumen, the director of the diagnostic kits and medical devices center at the Moroccan Foundation for Advanced Science, Innovation and Research (MASciRr), spoke in glowing terms of the young Moroccan researchers who developed the new, rapid Hepatitis C test.
Moumen, who is also the scientific director of Moldiag, added that the test will make it possible to quantify the viral load and to follow the patients on the different levels of the disease.
“These tests have been clinically validated in Morocco and internationally and have obtained regulatory registration in Morocco of a first batch of tests based on molecular technologies for the diagnosis and therapeutic monitoring of the disease,” Moumen said.
