Why healthcare innovation must be a team sport

IN 2020, Singapore was at the peak of the Covid-19 pandemic.

Doctors needed a quick way to detect exposure to Sars-CoV-2 to trace the path of the virus. At that time, testing could only be done with live viruses and in highly secure biocontainment facilities, meaning that the process was slow, time-consuming and expensive.

Clinicians shared what they knew with scientists, and worked together to find a solution. From there, the first-of-its-kind Covid-19 test was developed. It allowed faster contract tracing because it could detect the Sars-CoV-2 neutralising antibody without the use of a live virus.