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New saliva test could deliver Covid-19 result within one hour

The tests work by people spitting into a tube and posting the sample to a lab

A new saliva test could help the government meet its target of working out whether someone has coronavirus within 24 hours.

The government is in talks with British company Chronomics about rolling out the test which would involve people who are suspected to have Covid-19 spitting into a tube and posting the sample to a lab. The company is aiming to produce test results within one hour of the samples arriving at labs.

The saliva test produced by Chronomics could be examined at many more labs than swab tests  because the tube contains a solution that “inactivates” the virus. Under government rules, live samples of the virus can only be examined by labs with highly specialised equipment that conforms to its highest “containment level”.

The saliva tests are currently being validated (Photo by Andreas Rentz/Getty Images)

Philip Beales, a professor at the University College London Institute of Child Health which has worked with Chronomics, said to the Sunday Telegraph: “The saliva test has this inactivation buffer in the bottom, which inactivates the virus, preserves the RNA and then in thousands of [labs] in the country, you can just do a straightforward RNA extraction.”

He added: “Our guys are working on a one hour turnaround time from receipt of the sample in the lab, to getting the actual result back.”

Chronomics is understood to be carrying out a final study with Public Health England to validate its saliva kits, while it holds discussions with officials about providing the tests for use in the NHS and as part of the government’s mass testing programme.

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