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Rapid Large-Scale COVID-19 Testing during Shortages
The Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic caused by the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2) has resulted in economic and social lockdowns in most countries all over the globe. Early identification of infected individuals is regarded as one of the most important prereq...
Autores principales: | , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , |
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Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
Publicado: |
MDPI
2020
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Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7399816/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/32650631 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/diagnostics10070464 |
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author | Beetz, Christian Skrahina, Volha Förster, Toni M. Gaber, Hanaa Paul, Jefri J. Curado, Filipa Rolfs, Arndt Bauer, Peter Schäfer, Stephan Weckesser, Volkmar Lieu, Vivi Radefeldt, Mandy Pöppel, Claudia Krake, Susann Kandaswamy, Krishna K. Bruesehafer, Katja Vogel, Florian |
author_facet | Beetz, Christian Skrahina, Volha Förster, Toni M. Gaber, Hanaa Paul, Jefri J. Curado, Filipa Rolfs, Arndt Bauer, Peter Schäfer, Stephan Weckesser, Volkmar Lieu, Vivi Radefeldt, Mandy Pöppel, Claudia Krake, Susann Kandaswamy, Krishna K. Bruesehafer, Katja Vogel, Florian |
author_sort | Beetz, Christian |
collection | PubMed |
description | The Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic caused by the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2) has resulted in economic and social lockdowns in most countries all over the globe. Early identification of infected individuals is regarded as one of the most important prerequisites for fighting the pandemic and for returning to a ‘New Normal’. Large-scale testing is therefore crucial, but is facing several challenges including shortage of sample collection tools and of molecular biological reagents, and the need for safe electronic communication of medical reports. We present the successful establishment of a holistic SARS-CoV-2 testing platform that covers proband registration, sample collection and shipment, sample testing, and report issuing. The RT-PCR-based virus detection, being central to the platform, was extensively validated: sensitivity and specificity were defined as 96.8% and 100%, respectively; intra-run and inter-run precision were <3%. A novel type of sample swab and an in-house-developed RNA extraction system were shown to perform as good as commercially available products. The resulting flexibility guarantees independence from the current bottlenecks in SARS-CoV-2 testing. Based on our technology, we offered testing at local, national, and global levels. In the present study, we report the results from approx. 18,000 SARS-CoV-2 tests in almost 10,000 individuals from a low-frequency SARS-CoV-2 pandemic area in a homogenous geographical region in north-eastern Germany for a period of 10 weeks (21 March to 31 May 2020). Among the probands, five SARS-CoV-2 positive cases were identified. Comparative analysis of corresponding virus genomes revealed a diverse origin from three of the five currently recognized SARS-CoV-2 phylogenetic clades. Our study exemplifies how preventive SARS-CoV-2 testing can be set up in a rapid and flexible manner. The application of our test has enabled a safe maintenance/resume of critical local infrastructure, e.g., nursing homes where more than 5000 elderlies and caretakers got tested. The strategy outlined by the present study may serve as a blueprint for the implementation of large-scale preventive SARS-CoV-2 testing elsewhere. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-7399816 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2020 |
publisher | MDPI |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-73998162020-08-17 Rapid Large-Scale COVID-19 Testing during Shortages Beetz, Christian Skrahina, Volha Förster, Toni M. Gaber, Hanaa Paul, Jefri J. Curado, Filipa Rolfs, Arndt Bauer, Peter Schäfer, Stephan Weckesser, Volkmar Lieu, Vivi Radefeldt, Mandy Pöppel, Claudia Krake, Susann Kandaswamy, Krishna K. Bruesehafer, Katja Vogel, Florian Diagnostics (Basel) Article The Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic caused by the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2) has resulted in economic and social lockdowns in most countries all over the globe. Early identification of infected individuals is regarded as one of the most important prerequisites for fighting the pandemic and for returning to a ‘New Normal’. Large-scale testing is therefore crucial, but is facing several challenges including shortage of sample collection tools and of molecular biological reagents, and the need for safe electronic communication of medical reports. We present the successful establishment of a holistic SARS-CoV-2 testing platform that covers proband registration, sample collection and shipment, sample testing, and report issuing. The RT-PCR-based virus detection, being central to the platform, was extensively validated: sensitivity and specificity were defined as 96.8% and 100%, respectively; intra-run and inter-run precision were <3%. A novel type of sample swab and an in-house-developed RNA extraction system were shown to perform as good as commercially available products. The resulting flexibility guarantees independence from the current bottlenecks in SARS-CoV-2 testing. Based on our technology, we offered testing at local, national, and global levels. In the present study, we report the results from approx. 18,000 SARS-CoV-2 tests in almost 10,000 individuals from a low-frequency SARS-CoV-2 pandemic area in a homogenous geographical region in north-eastern Germany for a period of 10 weeks (21 March to 31 May 2020). Among the probands, five SARS-CoV-2 positive cases were identified. Comparative analysis of corresponding virus genomes revealed a diverse origin from three of the five currently recognized SARS-CoV-2 phylogenetic clades. Our study exemplifies how preventive SARS-CoV-2 testing can be set up in a rapid and flexible manner. The application of our test has enabled a safe maintenance/resume of critical local infrastructure, e.g., nursing homes where more than 5000 elderlies and caretakers got tested. The strategy outlined by the present study may serve as a blueprint for the implementation of large-scale preventive SARS-CoV-2 testing elsewhere. MDPI 2020-07-08 /pmc/articles/PMC7399816/ /pubmed/32650631 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/diagnostics10070464 Text en © 2020 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). |
spellingShingle | Article Beetz, Christian Skrahina, Volha Förster, Toni M. Gaber, Hanaa Paul, Jefri J. Curado, Filipa Rolfs, Arndt Bauer, Peter Schäfer, Stephan Weckesser, Volkmar Lieu, Vivi Radefeldt, Mandy Pöppel, Claudia Krake, Susann Kandaswamy, Krishna K. Bruesehafer, Katja Vogel, Florian Rapid Large-Scale COVID-19 Testing during Shortages |
title | Rapid Large-Scale COVID-19 Testing during Shortages |
title_full | Rapid Large-Scale COVID-19 Testing during Shortages |
title_fullStr | Rapid Large-Scale COVID-19 Testing during Shortages |
title_full_unstemmed | Rapid Large-Scale COVID-19 Testing during Shortages |
title_short | Rapid Large-Scale COVID-19 Testing during Shortages |
title_sort | rapid large-scale covid-19 testing during shortages |
topic | Article |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7399816/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/32650631 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/diagnostics10070464 |
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