I have gone nuts and paid someone to come to my house and do an antibody test on us

[LaurieFairyCake]

Can't take anymore not knowing so I've paid £260 to bike out a test from a lab and wait while we stab ourselves and return our blood to the lab

Dh thinks I've gone a bit batshit but I couldn't take anymore

Disclaimer : it won't affect my behaviour in line with current government guidelines

@LaurieFairyCake I was looking at this too but then I watched the video of having to squeeze out the blood from your finger after pricking it to fill up that little vial and it put me right off!!! Was it that bad??? Please tell me. I already had a swab test when I had symptoms which came back negative but I did it too late in my illness and it was sent by Royal Mail which took ONE WEEK to arrive so I’m sure that didn’t help either. Convinced I’ve had it though and would love to know for sure!

They are not accurate, there is a huge false negative rate and the positive results are for ANY coronavirus

Have you got a link for that statement about the Abbot test?

They don’t name tests but the experts have been testing these tests and found them inaccurate hence they are not presently being used.

www.google.co.uk/amp/s/amp.cnn.com/cnn/2020/04/28/health/coronavirus-antibody-tests-terrible/index.html

This directly talks about the Abott test and it’s flaws.

www.google.co.uk/amp/s/www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-8241057/amp/Abbotts-5-minute-coronavirus-test-producing-false-negative-results-15-time-study-finds.html

This tell you how you the Abott CoVid year, not the antibody, one performed the worst out of all available tests. The accuracy rates they claim and publish are not being reproduced during testing.

Forgot to post the link sorry

www.google.co.uk/amp/s/www.the-scientist.com/news-opinion/false-negatives-in-quick-covid-19-test-near-15-percent-study-67451/amp

I am very tempted to get a test myself. My GP suspected Coronavirus but I didn’t meet the testing criteria at the time. The reason that I want to know is because I was at work for weeks before I realised that I could have the virus. Only one other person in my team of 20 has showed symptoms - although there are confirmed cases elsewhere in the firm. I also took my DC’s to birthday parties, sports fixtures etc whilst I was ill. Again, although DS1 had mild symptoms, I am not aware of any of his friends or teammates becoming ill. There were confirmed cases in his school but not in his year. If I did get a positive result it would give me (and those around me) a better perspective of the risk of this virus.

Looking forward to hearing your results OP, hope you are positive then you can relax a bit. I suspect my household had this earlier in the year, my DD suffered kidney damage and was hospitalised from an unknown virus at the end of January at the same time her BF was contiunally sparking high temperatures and had a cough that didnt go for weeks. I know it was pre lockdown but we had been travelling abroad alot before that and it was the comments made at the hospital about my DDs temperature and not knowing what the infection was that made me think. I think an antibody test may clear things up for us.

This explains why you get inaccurate results on antibody testing and that even 90% specificity actually means 70% of false positives.

www.google.co.uk/amp/s/www.evaluate.com/node/15775/amp

@Madwife123 the link you posted aren't fir the Abbot Antibody test though, but to determine whether you have Covid now or not.

Thank you for those links, @Madwife123.

Your New Scientist and Daily Mail articles are about the quick 10-15 minute home-based rapid antibody tests.

Just for clarity in case people on the thread are confused, those are a different type of test to what OP is having, which is a lab-based ELISA one. The rapid tests are binary (they detect antibodies as yes/no) whereas ELISA tests can detect the quantity of antibodies and are supposed to pick up lower levels. (However independent verification is needed for ELISA tests too, of course, and different ELISA tests have different levels of accuracy.)

Your CNN article is based on a study that tested mainly the rapid 10-15 minute ones, but also two lab-based ones (ELISA) - this is the study link. They specify they haven't tested the Abbott ELISA test at this time.

I hope there'll be independent accuracy studies available for it the Abbott and Roche ELISA tests soon too, now that they're being rolled out.

This article, a few weeks old now, explains a bit more about the difference between the LFA rapid home tests (it's these ones that the government ordered and then couldn't use because they were so unreliable) and the newer ELISA method: oxfordbrc.nihr.ac.uk/common-antibody-test-can-be-adapted-for-covid-19-study-finds/

If you can afford it then why not.

I am tempted but would prefer my blood to be drawn

That’s a lot of blood that’s to be drawn. Especially from one finger!!

Any news, OP?

I would love to get this done and might depending still on your results.

Yes there is no guarantee of immunity if you test positive but it is looking likely for a while at least. Most health care workers have only had it once.

I do believe the lab based tests are in no way comparable to the home pregnancy type Covid tests.

What symptoms did you have op? Would be interested to compare.

Just coming on to also express surprise about the Eufy. That thing has kept my floors clean AND my kids entertained for most of lockdown. If it turns out this test also keeps cat hair at bay and gives teddies bus rides around the kitchen, however, I might reconsider...

On a more serious note, interested to see how this goes and hope it gives you the info you want, OP.

Doesn’t sound nuts to me I’d love to know if I’ve had it as am living apart but in the same house as DH who is shielding whilst working as an NHS nurse and it’s hard. If I could afford it, I’d do it.

I despair that the suggestion above that people may be able to get ‘immunity certificates’ after having these tests.
That can only happen if people have their blood taken and identity checked.
Otherwise people will just lie! Someone wants to go out, back to work, whatever, but they haven’t had Covid. Their friend has though, so they send off their friend’s blood.
It will happen. Definitely. And then there’ll be more infection
I work in a lab where we are performing the covid antigen testing. And if an antibody test becomes available, we’ll be doing that too. But allowing people to send blood in for testing is so dangerous.

heir friend has though, so they send off their friend’s blood

I used to work in a lab where we did urine testing to see if people were clean of drugs.

I heard about some of the tricks that people did to get 'clean' urine.

Place marking

Place

We’ve just sent my husbands test off today - took ages to get enough blood out of his finger.

What are you going to do when you get the results?