Lateral flow test - no vial of liquid included

[MrsSchadenfreude]

So I just spat in it to see what happened. I was expecting to get the “void” result but it worked and showed as negative.
I’m tempted to continue doing this in future rather than give myself a nosebleed twice a week, if it works. But should it work?

@MrsSchadenfreude

Well if it is just going to give a negative (rather than void) result wouldn’t this be an easy way to fake your day two test if you’ve flown in? So a bit of a farce?

I have to do it for work, so I just went to reception and got another test. It seems to be a bit of a duff batch as other people hadn’t had a vial of liquid in theirs either.

I mean you could always get somone else to take your test if you were that determined to find a way around it.

There are some instances when you're required to either do it supervised or have someone test you, otherwise I'm sure there's numerous ways you can get yourself a valid negative test result.

Otherwise it relies on trust!

I've had a few buffer fluid vials without the fluid in them (old style, rest in packet did have the fluid) plus some missing swabs. Quality control is clearly rubbish!

@Ifailed

Slightly related, I've had to throw out quite a few tests because I could not remove the metal foil cap on the vial (not without using some kind of brute force and damaging/contaminating the contents).

There seems to be no way of reporting this?

You can report it via the yellow card system as a medical device incident.