The National Public Health Reference Laboratory yesterday became the seventh laboratory to be certified by the Guyana National Bureau of Standards (GNBS).
But while the institution has added a number of new tests since it opened its doors in 2008, some cases will still have to be referred overseas, according to Minister of Health Dr Leslie Ramsammy, who said investment in certain testing “doesn’t make any sense. This lab adds to the menu of things we can do in Guyana and reduces significantly the number of things we send abroad but it does not eliminate the need to send things to CAREC [the Caribbean Epidemiology Centre] and does not eliminate the need to send things beyond CAREC. There are certain things that would continue, deliberately so, on reliance to external agencies.”
Ramsammy stressed that it did not make sense to invest in equipment and personnel as there would not be justification for certain testing,
