CORDLIFE Group will send the cord-blood samples from all affected tanks to a third-party laboratory by Thursday (Jan 18). Seven of its 22 cord-blood storage tanks had earlier been found to be kept at temperatures above acceptable limits by the Ministry of Health (MOH).

The testing of each sample batch may take three to six weeks to be completed, depending on whether a repeat test of samples from the same tank is needed, said the private cord-blood bank in a bourse filing on Wednesday.

“Since the end of December 2023, the company has started sending donated cord-blood samples from the affected tanks under investigation to a third-party laboratory in Singapore licensed by MOH for testing in batches,” said the company, which received a suspension notice by MOH at the end of November.

“To date, donated cord-blood samples from five tanks have been sent and the company aims to complete the sending of samples from all the affected tanks by Jan 18, 2024.”

It added that samples from the remaining unaffected tanks will also undergo testing in due course, and affected clients will be notified as soon as their relevant test results are available.

The company also responded to a recent article by The Business Times that the information on the temperature excursions between November 2020 and July 2022 was obtained mainly from the Laboratory Environment Monitoring Alarm System, instead of tank controller temperature data as reported.

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It added: “The tank controller temperature data is mainly used to support the findings that tank temperatures are within the acceptable range for certain affected tanks.”

The article on Monday highlighted that one of its storage tanks had hit a temperature as high as 20.4 degrees Celsius in 2021, way above international standards and the company’s internal acceptable range.

The company noted that as investigations are ongoing, it is unable to comment further on the contents of the article.

Cordlife : P8A 0% requested the lifting of its trading halt on Wednesday. Its counter last traded at S$0.305 on Monday.