The European Commission Announces a New Method for Detecting the Coronavirus

By
Adrian Gabor
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The European Commission Announces a New Method for Detecting the Coronavirus

The European Commission has officially announced a new method for detecting the Coronavirus in samples taken from people who are infected, or in connection with whom there is a suspicion of infection, the solution being an extremely important one to stop the pandemic.

The European Commission says that this new detection method is advanced enough to detect both the current variants of the virus and the future ones that could appear at any moment, and below you have details about what is happening now.

"A JRC study presents a versatile new method designed to detect current and future variants of SARS-CoV-2. All new circulation variants will be picked up more accurately in both clinical and wastewater samples.

The ongoing evolution of SARS-CoV-2 poses challenges for current detection tools. Since the beginning of the pandemic, SARS-CoV-2 has exhibited distinct sets of genetic changes capable of reducing diagnostic accuracy, but also ultimately evading existing immunity and conferring greater transmissibility of the virus.

With the paper entitled "New RT-PCR assay for the detection of current and future SARS-CoV-2 Variants" - published today in the special issue "Wastewater-Based Epidemiology (WBE) in COVID-19 Pandemics" of the scientific journal "Virusi" - The European Commission's Joint Research Center (JRC), in collaboration with scientists from Luxembourg and the Netherlands, have reached another milestone in efforts to mitigate the COVID-19 pandemic.

Unlike other available tests, the JRC RT-PCR test was specifically designed to detect genomic regions of the virus that are less prone to mutations. In this way, JRC scientists, with the help of partner laboratories, have developed a universal detection method so versatile that it is expected to detect all current and most likely all future variants of SARS-CoV-2.

The method also drastically reduces the possibility of false negative test results, e.g. a sample is tested negative when in reality it contains virus particles. The JRC also produced the control samples needed for wide, global distribution. All new variants like the Gryphon – the XBB.1.5 variant currently circulating mainly in the US – and all other possible variants circulating in China will not escape detection with this new method.”