The biochemist Pavol Čekan, who participated in the development of Slovak PCR tests to detect a new coronavirus causing COVID-19 infection, visited the Faculty of Medicine, UPJŠ on Friday, October 16, 2020. The Slovak company MultiplexDX and virologists from the Biomedical Center of the Slovak Academy of Sciences participated in the development of these special tests for the Slovak strain of SARS-CoV-2.
Pavol Čekan decided to donate 100,000 of these tests to Slovakia, of which 9,600 were donated to the Faculty of Medicine, UPJŠ for its laboratory for the diagnosis of the SARS-CoV-2 virus. The laboratory accredited by the Public Health Authority of the Slovak Republic was established in the premises of the science park MEDIPARK and its activities are ensured by the staff of the Department of Epidemiology FM UPJŠ and the Department of Medical and Clinical Biochemistry FM UPJŠ under the supervision of prof. Monika Halánová, D.V.M., PhD.
Professor Halánová together with several laboratory employees accepted gift of almost 10,000 PCR tests last Friday. “We will use the donated tests primarily for testing students and employees of our Faculty of Medicine, or other faculties and workplaces of the Pavol Jozef Šafárik University in Košice, if necessary, they will also be used for the public. We tested 1,271 international students at our own expense before the beginning of this academic year and we are currently testing our students of the 6th year of study who practice in hospitals in the two-week intervals, so such gift is very useful for us,” says prof. Monika Halánová, D.V.M., PhD., and according to her Pavol Čekan deserves a big thanks for the donated PCR tests to the Regional Public Health Authority and two Slovak medical faculties.
Who is Pavol Čekan
a scientist who returned to Slovakia after twenty years of living in the USA and Iceland. He researches the development of molecular diagnostics and prognoses of tumors and participated in the invention of diagnostic technology for the visualization of microRNAs in cells and tissues.
