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Vermont health authorities raise questions about coronavirus test results

 


As of Thursday evening, 17 of 59 people were undergoing traditional polymerase chain reaction (PCR) follow-up to confirm results, he said. Most have returned to negative.

“Of the 17 people, 15 were negative and 2 were positive,” Levine said at a news conference on Friday. “What does this mean? Our research is not complete, but many of the positive antigen results reported by the Manchester Medical Center may have been false positives.”

The FDA-approved antigen test in May was designed to quickly detect the virus that causes COVID-19 and can deliver results in minutes. However, it is not as sensitive as a PCR test, which gives you very accurate results, but it takes longer to complete.

Health officials in Vermont said PCR tests were used to confirm the results of those 17 antigen tests.

“The PCR test is the most common type of test used to diagnose or confirm COVID-19 infections, which is the test used by our public health labs,” Levine said. “Antigen testing is a new type of test that has only recently been approved by the FDA and will give results much faster than PCR testing.”

According to Levine, the antigen test is intended to be used as a screening tool for people with symptoms.

“There is no evidence of the accuracy of antigen testing in asymptomatic people,” he said. “It might be a great test for everyone, but we don’t know.”

So what causes so many presumed positive cases to be negative?

“Most of the 59 people who tested positive on the antigen test were asymptomatic,” Levine said. He also said that systematic factors related to test performance and the time elapsed between the two tests could also have affected.

Bennett Truman, a spokesman for the Vermont Health Department, said that people who test positive for the antigen test “have a mixture of Vermont and non-Vermont residents of the Manchester area.” I was told.

As of Friday morning, state officials contacted all but 11 of the 59 who tested positive. According to Truman, everyone is required to undergo a PCR test, but this is not required.

“Remember, we know two positive cases, only two,” Levine said. “We continue to investigate the situation, treat all positive antigen tests the same as all positive cases, reach out to each one, give them guidance for isolation and follow their contact. , Especially recommending to have a confirmatory PCR test.”

Levine asked those who are concerned that he might have contacted a person who had a positive reaction to contact their health care provider if they needed to be tested.

“We will learn more about antigen testing. They are useful tools for screening patients with symptoms,” Levine said. “But our recent PCR results show why we need to confirm them, so we have a more accurate picture of current infected patients.”


Emily Sweeney can be reached at [email protected].. Follow her on Twitter @emilysweeney..



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