Brazil’s Ministry of Health is trying to donate nearly 5 million tests for the detection of COVID-19 stranded in a government’s warehouse and which expire in April. In an effort to reduce inventory, Brazil’s government plans to deliver a million of these tests to Haiti, reported o Estado de São Paulo.

As the media outlet showed, Brazil’s Health Ministry had 7.1 million tests, the most suitable for diagnosing the disease, and most (96%) would have to go to waste between December and January. The product has gained another 4 months of validity and 2.1 million exams have been delivered so far, but the management continues to struggle to consume the stock because the detection process also requires swabs collection tubes and RNA extraction reagents, besides other inputs that Brazil has not been able to acquire on a large scale, says the newspaper.

A Brazil’s team is in Port-au-Prince to negotiate delivery and assess whether the country is in a position to receive the product. O Estado de São Paulo learned that the deal is being carried out between the Brazilian government and the Ministry of Health of Haiti.

The Brazilian government said that it will not donate extraction reagents and other inputs used during the analysis of the samples. “If Haitians do not have the means to carry out these analyzes or to carry out collections, it will not be possible for Brazil to initiate any eventual donation”, states a press note from the Health ministry.