Rapid antigen testing and non-infectious shedding of SARS-Cov2

Excerpt

We read with interest and appreciated the comment of Raveh et al. (INFE-D-20-02430) regarding our recent publication describing the clinical potential of a rapid antigen test to identify SARS-CoV2 infection in hospitalized COVID-19 patients with symptoms and RT-PCR confirmed diagnosis [1]. Therein, we found that the Panbio^R Antigen test had a good sensitivity in patients with high viral loads (Ct values < 25) with almost 86% of subjects being correctly detected. We also found that the test remained positive in a relevant number of patients, which according to the classification of the German Robert Koch Institute (RKI) or the US Center of disease control (CDC) would be considered as non-infectious. …