Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) Screening With Specimen Pools: Time to Swim, or Too Deep for Comfort?, Clinical Infectious Diseases

The outbreak and global spread of the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) continues to challenge the way physicians, laboratories, and public health officials diagnose and track cases. Testing was initially relegated to reference laboratories and academic medical centers with the expertise to rapidly design and validate laboratory-developed diagnostic assays to detect a novel virus. These laboratories quickly became overburdened, resulting in turnaround times beyond what is clinically actionable. The availability of commercial SARS-CoV-2 diagnostics decentralized coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) testing algorithms, resulting in increased testing capacity on a national level. However, despite the Herculean efforts of physicians, public health officials, and clinical laboratory personnel, significant challenges and case backlogs remain.
Source: Current Awareness Service for Health (CASH) - Category: Consumer Health News Source Type: news