The researchers reported that a device made by Abbott Laboratories, widely used to quickly detect the coronavirus, even among senior White House officials, had lost almost half of the positive cases detected by another common test.
Researchers at NYU Langone Health in New York compared Abbott ID Now to another device and found that 48% of positive cases detected by the other device had been lost. The NYU study was not peer reviewed and was published online the Tuesday before the official publication.
Medical experts say that what are known as false negatives could prompt people infected with the virus to unknowingly spread it. At the White House, where President Donald Trump, Vice President Pence and other senior officials are regularly assessed using the device, this risk was highlighted when two collaborators tested positive last week.
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The device can produce test results in less than 15 minutes. This rapid change caught the attention of Trump and other officials as test times increased in March.
Abbott said "it is not clear whether the samples were properly analyzed in this study". The company said it distributed approximately 1.8 million ID Now tests, and the rate of false negatives reported to Abbott is 0.02%.
An extended version of this report appears on WSJ.com.
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