At-home testing kits helped rapidly reduce the time for identifying COVID-19 infections, but even beyond the pandemic, there remains the concern for rapidly spreading the virus in large crowds.
A new device, however, can identify COVID infections with a quick breath test and deliver results in less than a minute. The small handheld tool could be a major benefit to places such as nursing homes and other long-term care facilities where there is close and constant interaction among vulnerable people.
The device also could be used to screen for new COVID strains or other airborne diseases, the researchers say.
Further, the biosensor technology the researchers used could be modified to detect new pathogens — or several at once — within two weeks of first analyzing the samples, the researchers claim.
Conducted by scientists at the Washington University in St. Louis, study findings were published in the journal Sensors.
“With this test, there are no nasal swabs and no waiting 15 minutes for results,” study co-author Rajan K. Chakrabarty, PhD, said in a statement. “A person simply blows into a tube in the device.”
Currently, the plan is to continue to test the device to improve its accuracy, before it becomes commercially available, the researchers said.
Despite the fact that COVID is no longer a public health emergency in the United States and elsewhere, there currently is a rise in COVID cases. Seniors living communities and nursing homes remain vulnerable and at greater risk overall.
Recent studies involving data collected through a smartwatch reinforce the value of COVID vaccinations among residents, patients and staff members, as well as the ability for vaccines to lessen symptoms.
