A study conducted from October to December on over 5,500 employees of the University of Padua demonstrated the effectiveness of the molecular salivary test for the detection of SarsCov-2 virus infection.
From 8 October to 24 December 2020, 5,579 employees joined the program, for a total of 19,850 salivary samples, assessed with the molecular technique for Ssrs-CoV-2.
A small percentage of people dropped out of the program after the first collection, but the remaining 5,350 employees repeated the saliva test (with cotton swab, chewed on waking) a minimum of 3 to a maximum of 5 times, for 11 weeks .
During this time, 62 positive samples were identified, with a frequency of 0.31%.
All saliva-positive employees underwent nasopharyngeal swab (NPS) within 24 hours: the tests were in agreement in 98% of cases.
The only patient with a positive but negative nasopharyngeal saliva test had a low viral load (Ct> 33).
The study, now published "International Federation of Clinical Chemistry and Laboratory Medicine", was conducted by researchers from the Padua-based company, coordinated by Prof. Mario Plebani, Director of the inter-company Department of Laboratory Medicine.
"Within 24 hours of the positive result - explains Prof. Pbelani - contact tracing was activated for employees and students who frequent the same work environment. This allowed the identification of three other positive employees, who were immediately isolated, preventing the development of outbreaks within the University ".
(HANDLE).
