With the state government’s move to permit private labs to carry out rapid antibody test, testing capacities in city will increase manifold in a few days. The Rapid antibody test will help in the surveillance for detection of carriers of Covid- 19 in a hotspot, which, in turn, will prevent community spread.
At present, there are three accredited labs, which can do it efficiently including MGMMC lab. According to the official communiqué of the district administration, Indore will get around 30,000 kits for antibody test in a couple of days.
What is the status of antibody kits in the city?
The Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) had let out that states who use antibody testing for surveillance are on real time RT-PCR tests for diagnosis. For the longest time the kits used by the government was showing unreliable results.
What is the difference between rapid antibody tests and the RT-PCR tests?
Antibody tests have been a long relied approach to find out the presence of a virus in the body. The antibody tests detect the presence and quantity of antibodies that are produced by the immune system for it to fight infection.
Known to be an indirect test, it cannot find the virus but figure out if the immune system has encountered it. Antibodies usually show up between 9 to 28 days after someone encounters an infection. Because of this, the infected person may spread the virus. This makes antibody kit tests unreliable.
According to guidelines of Indian Council of Medical Research, the antibody test is based on blood samples whilst the PCR test is based on throat swab.
On the other hand, the RT-PCR test uses a nasal or throat swab from the person suspected of having the virus. The test extracts RNA or ribonucleic acid, the genetic info of the virus and checks if it shared the same genetic sequence with the SARS-CoV-2 virus. Upon matching, the same is said to be positive.
Once a person tests positive during the antibody test, the real-time PCR test has to be done to confirm the result.
However, this test couldn’t replace PCR-based frontline test but could assist in early detection of virus by reducing the time of testing negative persons. This can be only utilised in patients with cold and cough symptoms for at least seven days but not before that.
While there is still uncertainty after the government took a decision to switch to private companies after returning batches of Chinese kits, we hope these kits across Indian states don’t fail quality tests.
With the current status of cases in Indore, out team hopes and wishes we are able to flatten the curve once and for all. Stay home, stay safe, follow government guidelines, and if travelling by road make sure to follow what the authorities say.