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Coronavirus: saliva test or nasopharyngeal smear, which should be preferred?

The saliva test is easier to perform than a nasopharyngeal smear, certainly in children, but it is less sensitive to the virus, interfederal spokesperson Frédérique Jacobs said on Monday at the press conference of the Crisis Center and of the FPS Public Health. She was questioned on the reliability of such an examination while some experts advocate using this method in local homes, especially at school.

“The best way to diagnose an infection (with the new coronavirus) is to do a nasopharyngeal smear (…) which can detect the genetic material of the virus. Unfortunately, this smear needs to be done by someone who has a habit of doing this and is particularly unpleasant and difficult to achieve in children “, explains Frédérique Jacobs.

This is why alternative methods to the nasal swab are offered, such as saliva testing. “These tests are easier to perform. The only small problem is that they are less sensitive than nasopharyngeal smears, that is, they might not detect the virus when it does. is not present in large quantities. If the virus is strongly present, however, it is as effective as a nasopharyngeal smear “, she emphasizes.

Such a test could therefore be used in the case of detections on a larger scale, for example screening in a population at risk of infection, argues the spokesperson. In that case, “we could be satisfied with making salivary smears or saliva samples, which will make it possible to detect people with a high viral load, and therefore highly contagious”.

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