Laboratory and field evaluation of the STANDARD Q and Panbio™ SARS-CoV-2 antigen rapid test in Namibia using nasopharyngeal samples.
PLoS One
; 17(9): e0269329, 2022.
Article
in English
| MEDLINE | ID: covidwho-2140419
ABSTRACT
BACKGROUND:
As new SARS-CoV-2 variants of concern emerge, there is a need to scale up testing to minimize transmission of the Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19). Many countries especially those in the developing world continue to struggle with scaling up reverse transcriptase polymerase reaction (RT-PCR) to detect SARS-CoV-2 due to scarcity of resources. Alternatives such as antigen rapid diagnostics tests (Ag-RDTs) may provide a solution to enable countries scale up testing.METHODS:
In this study, we evaluated the Panbio™ and STANDARD Q Ag-RDTs in the laboratory using 80 COVID-19 RT-PCR confirmed and 80 negative nasopharyngeal swabs. The STANDARD Q was further evaluated in the field on 112 symptomatic and 61 asymptomatic participants.RESULTS:
For the laboratory evaluation, both tests had a sensitivity above 80% (Panbio™ = 86% vs STANDARD Q = 88%). The specificity of the Panbio™ was 100%, while that of the STANDARD Q was 99%. When evaluated in the field, the STANDARD Q maintained a high specificity of 99%, however the sensitivity was reduced to 56%.CONCLUSION:
Using Ag-RDTs in low resource settings will be helpful in scaling-up SARS-CoV-2 testing, however, negative results should be confirmed by RT-PCR where possible to rule out COVID-19 infection.
Full text:
Available
Collection:
International databases
Database:
MEDLINE
Main subject:
SARS-CoV-2
/
COVID-19
Type of study:
Diagnostic study
/
Experimental Studies
/
Observational study
Topics:
Variants
Limits:
Humans
Country/Region as subject:
Africa
Language:
English
Journal:
PLoS One
Journal subject:
Science
/
Medicine
Year:
2022
Document Type:
Article
Affiliation country:
Journal.pone.0269329
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