A former military medic and JP Morgan banker has set up a coronavirus testing facility using veterans after his mother died with suspected Covid-19.
Ian Hannam set up Pyser Testing and has employed former British soldiers to administer antibody tests at the new facility based at the Honourable Artillery Company in the City.
His mother Sheila, 87, died at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Woolwich shortly before lockdown was announced in March. While doctors suspected she had contracted Covid, she was unable to receive a test.
The antibody test involves giving a small blood sample and determines the presence of antibodies, which indicate whether or not a person has previously had the virus and may now have some immunity to it.
Mr Hannam, a former captain in the Territorial Army, said: “My mother passed away and I saw the NHS just didn’t have the ability to test her. I just felt that I could do something to relieve the pressure on our health services and offer widespread public antibody tests.
"I was a TA medic so I knew that there were people out there who were qualified to do this, who may have been previously unemployed or made unemployed by the pandemic.”
Pyser Testing has already been administering 40 to 50 tests a day since setting up two weeks ago and has given free or discounted checks to veterans.
It offers a rapid 15-minute CTK Biotech test for £48 or the Abbott Sars-Cov-2 IgG test, approved by Public Health England, which gives results within 72 hours, for £96.
