British digital health company Babylon is offering COVID-19 antibody tests to anyone in the UK for its at cost price.
The FDA-approved tests, which do not have to be administered by a healthcare professional, can be taken at home and sent for analysis in a third-party lab, to determine whether or not a person has been previously infected by the virus.
Users can choose to opt-in to share information such as symptoms, location and test results to aid national research into the virus.
The tests, which cost £69, have been produced by diagnostics company Abbott and are lab-analysed by a fully accredited Eurofins laboratory in the UK.
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Research has shown that, unlike less reliable at-home rapid tests, these have 98.5% sensitivity and 99.5% specificity.
WHY IT MATTERS
When ordering the tests, patients can choose to share information about their symptoms, demographics, and testing history with researchers to provide them with invaluable information about the disease.
This is particularly important as much of the research done on COVID-19 patients has been done in hospitals on more serious cases, but little is known about the vast majority who experienced milder symptoms.
Babylon says it is committed to analysing and publishing the aggregated information with explicit consent from testers. It has also offered to share anonymised data with the research community and Public Health England in order to provide insights into the virus and guide public policy, such as planning for future health services and safely easing lockdown policies.
THE LARGER CONTEXT
UK online doctor service Zava has also launched a COVID-19 antibody test kit with a turnaround time of one to two days, which it says is 97.5% effective at detecting the presence of COVID-19 antibodies. The service, which costs £75 and is discounted for key workers, includes a home sampling kit and lab test, with results reviewed by Zava’s GMC-registered doctors if needed.
Source: MobiHealth News