Only two years ago, the thought of regularly shoving a stick up your nose to check you’re safe to meet family or go to work would have seemed a little, well, crazy. Now it’s the stuff of Twitter feeds, school-gate conversations and an awful lot of angst.
Testing, contact tracing, and isolating infectious people have been a large part of the strategy for tackling the COVID-19 pandemic worldwide. However, knowing which test to take, when, and why has confused many healthcare professionals, let alone the public. Let’s look at the different types of tests, how they work and when they might be useful.
Rapid Antigen or Lateral Flow Tests
These are perhaps the most commonly used type of test. Rapid antigen testing kits are made freely available to the general public in countries such as the UK. They are relatively easy to carry out, and the result is available within minutes. They test for the spike proteins (antigens) specific to SARS-CoV 2, the virus responsible for COVID-19, present in the nose and throat of people with the infection.
The more antigen in someone’s nose, the more likely the test will be positive. The people with more antigen in their noses are those who are more infectious and have more in the way of symptoms. Peak viral load takes several days to achieve, so someone may be infected and infectious for several days before a lateral flow test returns a positive result.
Sensitivity (the ability of the test to correctly identify someone who has the infection) varies depending on the brand of test, the viral load of the patient and how the test is performed. To pick up the spike proteins, the swab has to be stuck in the right place at the right time and mixed with the right chemical at the right time before being dropped onto the testing strip in the right amount. A Cochrane review showed lateral flow tests pick up a positive case about 72-78% of the time. A UCL study showed lateral flow tests had a sensitivity of 80% for all cases and 90% for those with symptoms.
In symptomatic patients, a positive test is very unlikely to be false positive – i.e. the person almost certainly has COVID-19 if they have a positive lateral flow test with symptoms. Some governments still recommend a confirmatory PCR, but there is some debate about whether this is necessary.
In a person without symptoms, a positive test is also unlikely to be false positive – i.e., the person probably has COVID-19 and should be isolated. This is an important factor in limiting the spread of the disease, as one in three cases in the UK are asymptomatic.  A confirmatory PCR test may be recommended in many countries.
The combination of no symptoms and a negative test will likely be accurate enough to exclude infection.
The issue comes when there are symptoms of infection but a negative result. The sensitivity of rapid antigen tests is not high enough to exclude COVID-19 infection. A common misconception amongst the public is that a negative lateral flow means no need to isolate. This is only true in the context of someone with no symptoms. If symptoms present, a negative lateral flow does not rule out COVID-19 and a PCR test is required.
So… lateral flow tests (rapid antigen tests) are useful if you have no symptoms and want to check you are safe to work or socialise.
PCR tests
Polymerase Chain Reaction, PCR, tests identify genetic material specific to the organism they are manufactured to test for. SARS-CoV 2 PCR tests look specifically for the virus causing COVID-19. Genetic material collected on the swab (inserted in the nose, throat or both) undergoes a process in which it is multiplied many times, so even a small amount of virus can be detected. PCR tests are highly sensitive, i.e. very good at correctly picking up someone with the infection. They can return a positive test much earlier during an infection than a rapid antigen or lateral flow test, even before someone becomes symptomatic. A positive test, symptoms or not, means you have COVID-19. A negative one means you very likely don’t.
They are more awkward to carry out, though. The test has to be arranged, often involving a visit to a test centre or delivery of a testing kit, and then taken correctly before being processed in a laboratory. Depending on the circumstances and conditions, results may take several hours to several days.
The other downside is that, due to the same system that makes PCR tests so accurate, they can detect tiny amounts of genetic material which may be present weeks after an active infection. The pay-off? An accurate result that can guide isolation, identify variants and assist in public health measures.
So…. PCR tests are useful if you have symptoms or if you need a high degree of accuracy.
LAMP testing
Loop-mediated isothermal amplification testing involves the amplification of viral RNA, usually in saliva samples. It’s reasonably quick (results within about an hour of arrival in the lab) and has high sensitivity and specificity but does require training and laboratory equipment (albeit much less than for PCR), refrigerated transportation of samples to the laboratory setting and spitting into a pot doesn’t appear (at least in the UK population) to be as attractive as sticking a swab up the nose.
Antibody tests
Seroconversion, the development of antibodies to the SARS-CoV-2 virus, happens about one to two weeks after the onset of infection. Antibodies can be detected in the blood until about a year post-infection. This test is not useful for rapidly identifying infectious people but can be used to guide research and monitor responses to vaccines or infection in the population.
The tests are important, but awareness of them and what those results might mean is even more important. Information and understanding are vital in a world where we need everyone to play their role. Let’s hope one day, we can all start to forget what it’s like to shove that stick up our nose.
Such a great information. This is really very helpful for bloggers
Very interesting stuff to read.
It’s great to know about different COVID tests such as the lateral flow tests which are the ones readily available to the public. I think this is because they are easy to use and for me, the government should really make an effort to distribute these as much as they can. It would be good to have assembly kits accessible when you experience symptoms so you can do self-isolation right away.