On Dec. 27, 2021, Sorrento Therapeutics announced that initial testing of COVISTIX on recombinant N proteins demonstrated its ability to detect the Omicron variant, in addition to detecting the original SARS-CoV-2 virus and its other major VoCs such as the delta and delta-plus strains.

The COVISTIX detection levels were similar for all variants. The ease of use and timely detection of Omicron infection was demonstrated by a case report of a Mexico patient infected with the Omicron variant detected first with COVISTIX in about 15-minutes test time. This result was confirmed a day later by RT-PCR and sequence verified a few days later to be Omicron infection.