Home tests can tell within 20 minutes if someone has ever been exposed (representative photo)
London:
The British government plans to roll out millions of free anti-coronavirus antibody tests that generate instant results after a finger prick after successful secret tests, according to a British press report.
Home tests, developed by a consortium of the University of Oxford with diagnostic companies, can tell in 20 minutes whether a person has ever been exposed to the deadly virus and was found to be 98.6% accurate when tested. human trials that took place in June. The Daily Telegraph reported.
“This rapid test looks really amazing, and it shows that we can do it ourselves,” said Sir John Bell, Regius professor of medicine at Oxford, who runs the British government’s antibody testing program.
So far, the only approved antibody tests in the UK have been on blood samples sent to laboratories for analysis, which can take several days. Now thousands of prototypes of the new finger prick have already been made in factories across Britain in anticipation of regulatory approval expected in the coming weeks, the newspaper said.
Ultimately, antibody tests should help reveal the levels of immunity people can develop against COVID-19, but so far it is unclear whether the prevalence of anti-coronavirus antibodies means future immunity against the disease.
The ministers hope that the AbC-19 lateral flow test will be available for use in a mass screening program before the end of the year. The new tests were developed by the UK Rapid Test Consortium (UK-RTC), a partnership between the University of Oxford and British diagnostic companies, including York-based Abingdon Health.
Dr. Chris Hand, head of UK-RTC and president of Abingdon Health, revealed that the new UK-made test had passed its first major clinical trial last month, involving nearly 300 people and conducted by scientists from the University of Ulster.
“It turned out 98.6% accurate, and that’s very good news,” said Dr. Hand to the newspaper.
“We had two R&D teams working day and night, seven days a week. This type of development program normally takes a year. We did it in 10 weeks. We are now stepping up with our partners to produce hundreds of thousands of doses each month, “he said.
According to government plans, the tests will be distributed to health professionals before being made available to millions of people at home, who would then send their results to a central database.
“If the coronavirus is like the flu and people need an annual vaccine, we will need mass tests to measure people’s antibody response to this vaccine. It’s part of the plan,” said Dr. Hand.
Unlike many competitors, the UK-RTC version uses the “full peak protein” part of the virus to capture so-called IgG antibodies when blood goes through the home test. If the result is positive, two pink lines appear within 20 minutes.
A spokesperson for the UK Department of Health and Welfare said: “We have received an extraordinary response to our call to action to provide antibody testing, and we continue to work with industry to identify other tests that are safe and accurate for use at home. While these tests will help us better understand how the coronavirus spreads across the country, it is not yet known whether the antibodies indicate immunity against reinfection or the transmission. “
(This story has not been edited by GalacticGaming staff and is automatically generated from a syndicated feed.)
