A team of "virus hunters" at Abbott Labs is working with health officials worldwide to monitor for new coronavirus variants, reports CNBC.
"They're constantly looking for new viruses, and in this case we set up a team to be able to monitor all the mutations that could exist," Abbott CEO Robert Ford told CNBC, adding that global collaboration with other countries, universities and specimen collection sites is crucial.
In January, the FDA warned clinicians that new variants could cause false negative results for some molecular COVID-19 tests, none of which are made by Abbott.
Now, scientists are working to create tests that detect parts of the virus that are less likely to mutate and cause inaccurate results, according to CNBC.