Do all corona tests detect an omicron infection?
Ciesek lists suitable rapid tests
Created: 2022-01-17Updated: 2022-01-17 11:12 am
By: Juliane Gutmann
Federal Minister of Health Lauterbach plans to publish a list of corona tests that identify Omikron particularly well.
A number of tests are already considered meaningful.
How meaningful a corona test is depends largely on the type. PCR tests offer the most reliable results, as the federal government informs on its website. They are the “gold standard” among the corona tests. When it comes to rapid antigen tests, it all depends on the product. For example, the Paul Ehrlich Institute (PEI), the Federal Institute for Vaccines and Biomedical Drugs, together with researchers from other institutions, examined 122 rapid tests for Covid-19 antigens for sensitivity and thus for their ability to detect the coronavirus.
The result: 96 rapid antigen tests met the required criteria, some with very good results, 26 tests did not offer the required sensitivity, as the PEI report shows.
But with every corona test, one hundred percent security cannot be given.
Even high-quality tests can produce false positive or false negative results.
Doctors and the responsible health authorities therefore recommend that a test result is always backed up by a follow-up test if you show corona symptoms.
A student does a rapid corona test before the first lesson at a school.
Pupils are among the most frequently tested groups in Germany.
But do common rapid tests also recognize the omicron virus variant?
© Sebastian Gollnow/dpa
The question of whether corona tests also detect the currently rapidly spreading and highly contagious omicron virus variant is currently in the air.
Health Minister Karl Lauterbach would like to create as much clarity as possible by having a list of particularly suitable tests drawn up.
As the
Bayerischer Rundfunk (BR)
quoted Lauterbach as saying, on January 9, 2022, he prompted the Paul Ehrlich Institute to “
prepare a positive list of tests that are particularly suitable for omicrons or that recognize omicrons well
”.
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Also read:
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These corona tests detect omicron variants
According to the PEI, the majority of the rapid corona tests offered in Germany should also be suitable for detecting the new omicron variant, the
BR
informs .
According to the Federal Ministry of Health, this means in figures that 80 percent of the antigen rapid tests checked can reliably detect the omicron variant.
Sandra Ciesek, Director of the Institute for Medical Virology at the University Hospital in Frankfurt, and Isabella Eckerle, Head of the Infectious Diseases Department in the Department of Medical Specialties at the University Hospital in Geneva,
have analyzed various rapid test products for their omicron sensitivity.
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The experts examined omicron samples from the nose and throat using rapid tests.
The following manufacturers therefore offer rapid corona tests that can detect omicron infections:
Roche
Siemens
Flowflex
Abbott
Acon Biotech
Remier Medical Corporation
CTK Biotech
As
Der Spiegel
further reports, a paper by the UK Health Security Agency from mid-December 2021 states that "preliminary laboratory data show that these devices detect Omicron".
For a more precise assessment, however, further data would have to be awaited.
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