"Apply New COVID-19 Response Technologies in the Field"

[Asia Economy Reporter Junho Hwang] "What is the reason that new technologies to respond to the novel coronavirus infection (COVID-19) have difficulty being deployed on-site?"

On the 17th, this was a major topic at the 'Public Research Outcome Dissemination Council (hereafter ‘Council’)' held in the meeting room of the Ministry of Science and ICT. Participants included the National Research Council of Science & Technology, Daedeok Research and Development Special Zone Headquarters, National Research Foundation of Korea, Korea Industrial Technology Promotion Association, and Korea Science and Technology Job Creation Agency.

They introduced candidate technologies that could be considered for on-site application to respond to infectious diseases such as COVID-19, and discussed the reasons why their rapid application is difficult, as well as policy·and institutional improvement directions.

The candidate technologies introduced included infectious disease diagnostic devices, virus cleaning technologies, and disinfectants. The main reason cited for the difficulty in commercializing these technologies was various permits and approvals. In particular, since these technologies are applied to the human body, opinions were received that the costs and time required for the approval process are even greater. Additionally, repeated testing or additional technology development to improve the completeness of the technology and products, a tendency to prefer foreign equipment on-site, and market development for mass production were identified as challenges.

The Ministry of Science and ICT stated that it will carefully analyze these challenges to derive policy and institutional improvement tasks. Also, based on this, it will support the rapid commercialization and on-site application of public research outcomes related to infectious diseases.

First Vice Minister Jeong Byeong-seon said, "In this national crisis caused by the spread of COVID-19, the great social role of the public research outcome commercialization institutions attending today is required," and added, "Please focus the capabilities of each institution on discovering public research outcomes that can be used to respond to infectious diseases such as COVID-19 and their rapid on-site application so that we can overcome the current crisis as soon as possible."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.