Could rapid antigen tests help fight the war on COVID-19?
New South Wales Premier Gladys Berejiklian today announced her government wants to introduce rapid antigen tests for COVID-19 at worksites and in schools.
The rapid tests are being used overseas but until now have been avoided by our health officials.
Could these tests be a weapon in the war against the virus?
“We need to look at every tool in the toolbox,” former head of the WHO’s emergency medical team Dr Ian Norton told A Current Affair.
While many know the importance of getting tested, Australians must queue for PCR COVID-19 testing which is then analysed in laboratories and can take days for a result.
Rapid antigen tests are cheaper, more accessible and only take minutes.
“It can get to scale fast and this is when we really need to look at tens of thousands of tests per day,” Dr Norton said.
He also advised the Federal Government on how to manage the Howard Springs quarantine facility and said rapid antigen tests were effective.
Dr Norton said the tests were useful “when we repeat it again and again”, particularly for workers in aged care, manufacturing and food security.
Dr Sean Parsons developed one of Australia’s first rapid test kits in Brisbane and has sold millions to the US government.
He said while rapid tests aren’t “the silver bullet”, Australia also “can’t keep having these lockdowns indefinitely”.
“There is a law prohibiting self-testing for COVID-19, and it’s more about notifiable diseases not being done by doctors,” he said.
“It makes sense to move it out of the hands of the legislators, out of the hands of politicians and put in the hands of the TGA, the regulators, as the TGA is the world’s largest independent regulator, they’re more than capable of making up their own minds.”
Dr Parsons’ test is so simple you can do it yourself.
Taking a less invasive nasal swab, it communicates via your smart phone, producing a result in 15 minutes, which it also sends to health authorities.
The rapid tests are also more sensitive at picking up the virus in people who are not showing symptoms.
Atomo is another Australian company making rapid testing kits which are being trialled at two aged care facilities where visitors and staff are tested before they enter.
“There’s more support for workers going into those facilities as well as relatives who want to visit their family members,” Atomo CEO John Kelly said.
Mr Kelly said the turnaround times of PCR tests don’t suit regular community testing and they’re expensive.
Ms Berejiklian was the first premier to announce her state wanted to use rapid testing, saying it would help with their current COVID-19 outbreak.
“We are keen to have rapid antigen testing at key worksites and also at school campuses when Year 12 goes back,” Ms Berejiklian said.
NSW Health laboratories are struggling to quickly return test results because of the numbers being tested and it has cost taxpayers more than $580 million.
Dr Norton said it’s time for Australia to start adapting to technology and he believes rapid tests should be claimable on Medicare.
However, he’s not suggesting PCR lab tests are abandoned completely.
“We do the PCR, particularly when we’re trying to find the very smallest amount of virus,” he said.
But can rapid testing be trusted?
Dr Norton said the rapid tests are very accurate when it comes to detecting super spreaders, and they’ve been able to learn from their successful use in the US.
“We’re trying to find the people in the community that are most infected and will pass on to other so-called super spreaders,” Dr Norton said.
“These tests are extremely valid for that. They are not as accurate in those who have very low viral loads, but … does that really matter because they’re not really shedding into it to others?”
