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Health officials in England passed a test to determine if people were ever infected with coronavirus.
Public Health England said an antibody test developed by the Swiss pharmaceutical company Roche is a “very positive development.”
The blood test looks for antibodies to see if a person has already had the virus and may now have some immunity.
Until now, officials have said these tests were not reliable enough.
But sources say this is the first to offer great potential.
Experts at the Porton Down government facility evaluated the test last week, Public Health England said, and found that it was “highly specific.”
Professor John Newton, national coordinator of the UK coronavirus testing program, said: “This is a very positive development because such a highly specific antibody test is a very reliable marker of past infections.”
“This in turn may indicate some immunity to future infections, although the extent to which the presence of antibodies indicates immunity remains unclear.”
Roche is understood to be in talks with the Department of Health and Social Care about the possible use of the NHS in England, although other test products are also being evaluated.
Health officials in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland make their own decisions, but they are likely to do the same if England adopts it.
The device already has the approval of medical regulators in the EU and the United States.
But it is still unclear how much immunity to the coronavirus a patient could obtain from having previously been infected.
Antibody testing for coronavirus has long been seen as an important part of the toolkit for plotting a path outside of blocking restrictions.
If workers have already had the virus and been immunized, they are sure to go to work, especially health and social work personnel.
Recent attempts to purchase antibody tests have failed because they have been deemed unreliable.
Sources say this latest test device, produced by Roche, is the first to offer great potential.
Discussions are ongoing with the government on whether it can be produced at scale and at a reasonable cost.
Understandably, Whitehall’s sources don’t budge much because they don’t want to undermine his negotiating hand.
‘False hope before’
Last week, Health Secretary Matt Hancock said the UK was in talks with Roche about a “large-scale deployment” of tests for antibodies to the coronavirus.
But he acknowledged that there had been “false hopes” before and that he would only make an announcement when the government was “absolutely ready.”
The Department of Health and Social Assistance said an announcement about antibody tests would be made “in due course.”
A spokeswoman said: “Antibody testing is an important part of our strategy to counter the spread of Covid-19 and help us understand who has had the disease.”
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