Alliance for Pandemic Preparedness

February 8, 2021

Field Performance Evaluation of the PanBio Rapid SARS-CoV-2 Antigen Assay in an Epidemic Driven by 501Y.v2 (Lineage B.1.351) in the Eastern Cape South Africa

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[Pre-print, not peer-reviewed] A prospective diagnostic evaluation of the field performance of the Abbott PanBio antigen test indicated that the assay reliably detected SARS-CoV-2 variant 501.V2 (lineage B.1.351) infections in patients presenting at mobile community testing centers in South Africa, with sensitivity strongly dependent on viral load (100% detection if cycle threshold (CT) was <20, 96% if CT was 20-25, 89% if CT was 26-30, and 64% if CT was 31-35). RT-PCR was performed on the original nasopharyngeal antigen swabs to evaluate test performance, and the antigen test had an overall sensitivity of 69.2% and specificity of 99.0% in this clinical context. 

Akingba et al. (Feb 5, 2021). Field Performance Evaluation of the PanBio Rapid SARS-CoV-2 Antigen Assay in an Epidemic Driven by 501Y.v2 (Lineage B.1.351) in the Eastern Cape South Africa. Pre-print downloaded Feb 8 from https://doi.org/10.1101/2021.02.03.21251057