MedMira Inc. the global market leader in flow-through diagnostics for infectious diseases, announced today that its MiraWell™ Rapid HIV Test has been designated as the number one rapid HIV antibody test, according to results of the National Clinical Evaluation for HIV Antibody Tests published by the Centres for Disease Control (CDC) in the People’s Republic of China.

This evaluation was conducted jointly by the national and provincial CDC laboratories on all HIV tests and has been made available to all HIV testing centres across the country (www.chinaids.org.cn).

The Chinese Department of Health’s National HIV Testing Guidelines require nationwide clinical evaluation of all HIV tests, including both ELISA (traditional HIV testing) and rapid tests. Of the ten rapid HIV tests evaluated, MedMira’s was the best; the only rapid HIV product with an accuracy surpassing 98%. Accuracy for this study was calculated as a measure of the product’s sensitivity (the ability to correctly detect a true HIV-positive sample) and specificity (the ability to correctly detect a true HIV-negative sample).

In addition, MedMira’s product performed as accurately as ELISA, according to the study. China has been reported to be battling one of the most rapidly increasing HIV infection rates in the world (rising 30% yearly since 1998). It is currently estimated that 1 million Chinese are HIV- infected and that, without intervention, China can anticipate this to increase to 10 million by 2010.