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FDA just cleared a $20 Covid-19 antibody test

coronachecktest.com

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Re: FDA just cleared a $20 Covid-19 antibody test

#31

Post by gpm »

ars wrote: post #7

Keep in mind this is an antibody test, it only works >1 week after someone gets sick. It might help differentiate COVID from Flu if someone is sick, but it's not great for screening otherwise healthy people.

I'm curious what you're basing the 1 week off of?

As far as I can tell the company isn't reporting any data about how long it takes, but they think that it is likely to be similar to SARS per their manuscript: https://coronachecktest.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/Devel...

> It was reported that after SARS infection, IgM antibody could be detected in patient blood after 3-6 days and IgG could be detected after 8 days. Since COVID-19 belongs to the same large family of viruses as those that cause the MERS and SARS outbreak, we assume its antibody generation process is similar, and detection of the IgG and IgM antibody against SARS-CoV-2 will be an indication of infection.

Re: FDA just cleared a $20 Covid-19 antibody test

#32

Post by product50 »

jupp0r wrote: post #24

> The sensitivity is 97.90 %, the specificity is 91.77%. This seems like it could provide a false sense of security to many if used widely by the general population.

Some smart ass always has to comment how this is not perfect and thus not useful. Look at the alternatives. Should we just keep on waiting otherwise?

Re: FDA just cleared a $20 Covid-19 antibody test

#34

Post by erentz »

baybal2 wrote: post #5

That's an antibody test, not an RNA test. Quite a different thing. It will only detect an infection when you have an immune response already. It will not if you don't. RNA tests can detect the virus even if it doesn't turn a person diseased.

One reason people seem to be missing for why antibody tests are very useful is it will allow us to confirm those that are now immune. We can’t get this from the RNA testing because it’s primarily being used on only symptomatic people at the time they have symptoms (and then only if they can get the test which typically means severe symptoms)

But if we start to test widely for antibodies we can start to clear people from this effective quarantine/lock down situation we are going through. Those people can then start to go back to regular life (what’s left of it), moving around as normal, doing work helping others, so on, and that will help all of us (and of course the economy).

I don’t know if this is something that anyone official is talking about yet, but it seems like it should be.

Re: FDA just cleared a $20 Covid-19 antibody test

#35

Post by jariel »

They need to be free, universal, and possibly mandated in some areas.

Given the 'cost' is shutting down the economy and 1 trillion Fed bailout, it's probably worth widespread distribution of these things, and nailing down 'everyone' who has it, just as S. Korea is doing. They have not 'shut down' their country, they're just aggressive at going after cases.

Re: FDA just cleared a $20 Covid-19 antibody test

#36

Post by skellington »

kragen wrote: post #28

"Qualatative detection of COVID-19’s IgM and IgG antibodies" I hope their test kits are more carefully made than their website. I mean, normally I know it's in poor taste to criticize someone's spelling, since what really matters is their ideas, not their educational background or learning disabilities. But I think this case is an exception: we're talking about a company who's claiming to offer a solution to the bigg…

Why? That's how the test kit works. It develops colored stripes that you QUALITATIVELY interpret. There is interpretation in the meaning of the saturation of the strip color.

Re: FDA just cleared a $20 Covid-19 antibody test

#37

Post by kragen »

jupp0r wrote: post #24

> The sensitivity is 97.90 %, the specificity is 91.77%. This seems like it could provide a false sense of security to many if used widely by the general population.

It also means that, if that number is correct, 8.23% of not-yet-infected people will test positive. At a time when only 0.01% of people are infected, that means that 8.2301% of people will test positive, and of those people, on average one person† of every 82301 people will have the infection; the other 82300 are all false positives. They'll need to improve that for this to be useful, since at the time 1% of the population is infected, you're already suffering the worst catastrophe in a century.

† (well, precisely 0.979 out of every 82300.979 people, but the difference is not significant in this context)

Re: FDA just cleared a $20 Covid-19 antibody test

#38

Post by frandroid »

Gibbon1 wrote: post #19
baybal2 wrote: post #5

That's an antibody test, not an RNA test. Quite a different thing. It will only detect an infection when you have an immune response already. It will not if you don't. RNA tests can detect the virus even if it doesn't turn a person diseased.

I think it's likely useful for mild cases and for detecting people previously infected. People that recovered can be put to work in hazardous places. And can donate plasma to make serum[1] for treating sick people. [1] Antivirals are a crap shoot but serum works hands down.

How about a source for that [1]

Re: FDA just cleared a $20 Covid-19 antibody test

#39

Post by hackcasual »

baybal2 wrote: post #17
hackcasual wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This also requires a blood sample, as opposed to a swab.

That's actually better, some competent people said, because the chance of contact with virus carrying bodily fluids is eliminated

Except people generally don't like needle sticks.

Re: FDA just cleared a $20 Covid-19 antibody test

#40

Post by CriticalCathed »

Is this a serum or antibody test? If so, this is very good news.

If mass testing occurs we will know very soon the true nature of the disease. For example, after serum testing for H1N1 we learned -- to our horror -- that 1.4 billion people had it. However, it also meant that H1N1 wasn't as dangerous as we thought it was.

I hope this will give the medical community and our governments the clear data we desperately need. The decisions our governments are making are based on unsound data -- we are flying blind.

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