The SARS-CoV-2 virus, the strain that causes COVID-19 can be detected in under an hour with a test kit developed by Prof. Naama Geva-Zatorsky and her team at the Rappaport Faculty of Medicine, together with colleagues at the Rambam Health Care Campus. The kit gives results without the need to send samples to a lab.

“We developed a protocol for a test that requires only a saliva sample, reagents, and a thermal cup,” explains Geva-Zatorsky. At the height of the first onslaught of the new coronavirus in Israel, the team measured their test’s reliability using 200 biological samples from COVID-19 patients. “We found that, when tested on standard swabs, in medium and high concentrations of the virus, the test identifies 99% of the cases, but in low concentrations a second test is necessary a few days later,” said Geva-Zatorsky.

This test is not designed to replace the current coronavirus testing protocol, but to supplement it, and make testing more widely available to the public.