Coronavirus Heroes - Being 8 Months Pregnant Didn’t Stop This SHERO From Delivering COVID-19 Test Kits To The Nation

In the battle against coronavirus, India has been criticised time and again for a poor record of testing people. Amidst all of this, there is change set to be brought about, a large part of which is accredited to the one and only virologist - Minal Dakhave Bhosale.

Ms Bhosale headed the team that designed the coronavirus testing kit (called Patho Detect)  in India and is also the R&D chief of Mylabs discovery, Pune. She had just been informed of a pregnancy complication in february, right after which despite personal circumstances, willingly took on the assignment of designing the coronavirus test kits.

Up until now, India had to import COVID-19 kits from Germany at Rs.4500 per kit, but the molecular diagnostic company has been successful in creating a kit that is now able to test 100 samples and costs Rs 1,200 - literally a quarter of the cost of COVID-19 testing kits that were being imported. 

Besides being relatively much lower than kits imported from outside, the team also achieved COVID-19 testing in just two and a half hours compared to other tests that took no less than 6-7 hours. 

What is most fascinating about her story is that Ms Bhosale managed to complete her assignment on time and while being 8 months pregnant, only a couple of hours before she delivered her baby daughter. 

In the words of Ms Bhosale (to BCC) : “ It was an emergency, so I took this on as a challenge. I have to serve my nation”. A true inspiration to women across the world and a real team player - a thousand salutes to the women who put her nation first in the most critical of situations. 

Minal Dakhave Bhosale- A real life hero, A SHERO, as one may say.