Health authorities said Wednesday that they are seeking to develop and introduce by the end of this year a test kit that can detect the omicron variant in a day. 

The authorities said the test kit, which is under development in a public-private partnership, will detect the new variant in a day using a polymerase chain reaction(PCR) technique.

They said the planned test could detect a total of five variants of COVID-19 - alpha, beta, gamma, delta and omicron. 

The current PCR test can only detect four variants and not omicron.

Health authorities also rejected media reports that it takes more time for South Korean quarantine authorities to detect and determine the omicron variant compared to the United States and Britain.