# Addressing Barriers to the Development and Adoption of Rapid Diagnostic Tests in Global Health

## TL;DR

This paper explores the challenges in developing and adopting rapid diagnostic tests for global health and suggests ways to overcome them.

## Contribution

The paper identifies and discusses barriers to the broader adoption of RDTs beyond malaria and proposes a path forward.

## Key findings

- RDTs for malaria have achieved high maturity and market penetration.
- Adoption of RDTs for other diseases is hindered by technical, social, and economic challenges.
- Addressing these barriers could improve global health outcomes through broader RDT use.

## Abstract

Immunochromatographic rapid diagnostic tests (RDTs) have demonstrated significant potential for use as point-of-care diagnostic tests in resource-limited settings. Most notably, RDTs for malaria have reached an unparalleled level of technological maturity and market penetration, and are now considered an important complement to standard microscopic methods of malaria diagnosis. However, the technical development of RDTs for other infectious diseases, and their uptake within the global health community as a core diagnostic modality, has been hindered by a number of extant challenges. These range from technical and biological issues, such as the need for better affinity agents and biomarkers of disease, to social, infrastructural, regulatory and economic barriers, which have all served to slow their adoption and diminish their impact. In order for the immunochromatographic RDT format to be successfully adapted to other disease targets, to see widespread distribution, and to improve clinical outcomes for patients on a global scale, these challenges must be identified and addressed, and the global health community must be engaged in championing the broader use of RDTs.