OraSure partners with Walgreens to promote HIV testing

OraSure Technologies on Thursday announced several new HIV testing-related initiatives in recognition of World AIDS Day.  OraSure is working with The AIDS Institute to launch a grant program to encourage the development of HIV self testing programs and collaborating with both The AIDS Institute and Walgreens, based in Deerfield, Ill., to promote rapid HIV testing in cities across the U.S.



Bethlehem, Pa.-based OraSure and Walgreens are launching the OraQuick In-Home HIV Test Retail Access Card, available for public health organizations and advocacy groups across the country to distribute to their at-risk program participants during outreach events.  Each card will be redeemable for one OraQuick In-Home HIV Test kit at no cost, at any one of the 8,000+ Walgreens and Duane Reade drugstores nationwide. 



“The Walgreens OraQuick HIV Test Retail Access Card will allow public health entities to utilize our expansive retail network to help get in-home HIV tests into the hands of customers who need one,” stated Glen Pietrandoni, senior director, patient care and advocacy at Walgreens. “In collaboration with OraSure, we are looking forward to working with Housing Works as well as other HIV/AIDS advocacy groups across the country as we continue to build on our 35-year history of community support in highly impacted communities.”



Initially, Walgreens and OraSure will provide the OraQuick In-Home HIV Test Retail Access Cards to Housing Works, a New-York City-based public health organization for people living with and affected by HIV/AIDS. And, in honor of World AIDS Day, OraSure, Walgreens and Housing Works will host a free HIV testing event on Dec. 1, from 11 a.m. until 4 p.m. EST at the Duane Reade located at 1430 Broadway in New York City. Free, OraQuick Advance HIV1/2 tests will be offered on a first come, first served basis as space and supplies permit.



"We are very proud to launch several programs aimed squarely at enabling HIV testing in support of World AIDS Day," stated Douglas Michels, president and CEO of OraSure Technologies. "A key challenge to ending HIV is to test as many individuals as possible who have not been previously tested so they can know their status and be linked to care."



In addition to supporting numerous community testing events across the country, OraSure will host the NASDAQ Stock Market Opening Ceremony followed by a special HIV testing industry panel discussion focused on Global Leadership in HIV Self-Testing: Innovative Approaches to Achieve HIV Testing Goals.



The panel discussion will be webcast live here starting at 10 a.m. EST on Dec. 1.



Guests for the NASDAQ market opening ceremony and panel discussion will include Karl Hofmann, president and CEO of Population Services International; Lelio Marmora, executive director, UNITAID; Jeffrey Klausner, professor Medicine and Public Health UCLA David Geffen School of Medicine and Fielding School of Public Health.