They are snatched up in pharmacies under the threat of the Omicron variant, so much so that it is sometimes difficult to find them. Between 80,000 and 120,000 self-tests have been sold daily in recent days, reports Franceinfo Gilles Bonnefond, president of the Union Syndicale des Pharmaciens de Pharmacie.
And this rush is straining the resupply chains. In France, the main manufacturer of self-tests, the Alsatian Biosynex, can no longer keep up with demand and announces a week to deliver, just like one of its competitors, the American Innova Medical Group, which assembles and packages tests in Pithiviers, in the Loiret. “We have to face an extremely large and rapid demand”, underlines Nicolas Contassot, vice-president for Europe of the company.
“The pandemic is global, so we have strains on test components, finished and assembled tests, and logistics.”
Nicolas Contassot, European vice-president of the test manufacturer Innova Medical Groupto franceinfo
Apart from the predictable peaks in demand for New Years Eve, tests and self-tests should be a lasting force in our lives. “Vaccination coverage is not enough to control the circulation of viruses”, recalls Nicolas Contassot of Innova Medical Group. In addition to the vaccine, it is therefore necessary to be able to benefit from screening tools. Hence the estimation of Nicolas Contassot, that “In the next two, three, four years, the test is going to be part of our daily lives, most likely.”
Faced with a demand that will continue, even in waves at the time of the holidays or the holidays, manufacturers are investing. Biosynex has commissioned new production lines and increased its workforce. The Lyon Boiron laboratory is also involved.
The American Innova has found a French partner to establish itself permanently in Pithiviers, in the Loiret. This is the Axyntis chemistry group. The new factory is still in its infancy, “it hosted three assembly machines, out of 35 possible” as David Simonet, CEO of Axyntis recounts. At full throttle she could “to manufacture at least one million self-tests daily. We already have more than ten employees on the Pithiviers site, and we are going to thirty in January.”
“If the Pithiviers plant starts producing more than a million self-tests daily, up to 200 to 220 employees could even be hired on the site.”
David Simonet, CEO of the Axyntis chemistry groupto franceinfo
This industrial development is participating in the relocation of part of the drug industry, but the majority of molecules and components necessary for the manufacture of self-tests remain for the moment manufactured in Asia.