A New Rapid Test to End COVID

TL;DR

This paper introduces CLDC, a rapid, sensitive, low-cost COVID-19 test designed to effectively curb the spread of all variants, including Omicron, by providing a scalable solution amid ongoing pandemic challenges.

Contribution

The paper presents CLDC, a novel rapid COVID-19 test with over 98% sensitivity, addressing current testing limitations and aiding in controlling virus transmission.

Findings

CLDC achieves over 98% sensitivity.

The test is low-cost and scalable.

Potential to significantly reduce COVID-19 spread.

Abstract

Despite 93.1% to 95.8% of the UK adult population having been vaccinated and currently 83.5% to 89.8% of adults having received at least two doses (1), and despite many households testing twice a week with lateral flow tests (2), R at the time of writing is 0.9 to 1.1, with a growth rate range for England of between -1% and +1% (3). Furthermore, up to 30% of infected individuals are going on to experience Long Covid (4). The crisis is far from over and as new variants of concern like Omicron spread, the situation is not under control, even in the highly vaccinated and tested UK and far less so in many countries. The problem is likely to be replicated in other countries with currently low infection levels as isolation is eased in future, even if these countries reach a high level of vaccination. Additionally, concerns have been raised about fall in immunity by 6 months after receiving the Pfizer and AstraZeneca vaccines (5), and the ability of Omicron to re-infect and cause illness in vaccinated people, with urgent booster jabs now being given to attempt to mitigate this. A solution to stop the spread of all variants of COVID-19 is needed now, and we present it here: CLDC, a rapid test that is 98%+ sensitive, low cost and scalable.