London (dpa) – Rapid coronavirus tests are showing increasingly accurate results, according to new data from England released on Thursday.
Figures from England’s health body, Public Health England, showed 82 per cent of positive test results from lateral flow tests matched the results of the PCR tests, the British broadcaster BBC reported.
Some 26 million lateral flow test results were recorded by Public Health England in the four weeks from March 8 to April 4.
Around 99.88 per cent of those resulted negative, while 30,904 cases were positive. When those tested positive were sent off for PCR testing, it found 13,918 – or 82 per cent – of the original lateral flow tests had given accurate results.
PCR testing is more accurate but takes several days to retrieve results. Lateral flow tests, which are those being rolled out by the British government for pupils in schools, give results within 30 minutes.
Concerns have been raised about the accuracy of the more rapid tests by scientists, especially regarding false negatives in self-administered tests.
Last month, a study published in the British Medical Journal said lateral flow tests are better at identifying Covid-19 infections in people with symptoms than those without symptoms.
Analysis from medical researchers at Cochrane found accurate tests in symptomatic people ranged from 34 per cent to 88 per cent, with an average of 72 per cent.
With those who did not have symptoms, the tests correctly identified an average of 58 per cent of infections.