MANDALUYONG CITY -- Widespread testing for COVID-19 is crucial in efforts to protect the public from the disease. That is why the Philippine Red Cross (PRC), under the leadership of its Chairman and CEO Senator Dick Gordon, continues to provide low-cost and accurate COVID testing options to the country.

In the first half of 2021, PRC launched its saliva reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) test to provide a cheaper, faster, and non-invasive test for COVID-19.

WHY SALIVA RT-PCR?
The current gold standard for testing is the nasopharyngeal swab, an invasive way of getting tested involving having a swab inserted into your nose and twirled around for several seconds. For most, the nasopharyngeal swab is uncomfortable and causes people to cough or sneeze, putting the swab collector at high risk of getting infected.

Thus, Yale researchers, led by Dr. Ann Wyllie of the Yale School of Public Health in collaboration with Dr. Shelli Farhadian of Yale School of Medicine, have studied saliva as a reliable alternative to detect SARS-CoV-2.

The Yale researchers identified that saliva as a more reliable and accurate means of diagnostic testing. The potential impact of this sampling method will allow many people to be tested for the coronavirus.

HOW ACCURATE IS SALIVA RT-PCR?
According to PRC lead researcher Michael Tee, the saliva Covid-19 test’s accuracy rate is 98.23 percent.

In an earlier statement, PRC biomolecular laboratories chief Paulyn Ubial said their study showed that the saliva-based test was 98.11 percent accurate in testing for coronavirus.

On the other hand, the RT-PCR swab test has a 99-percent accuracy rate.

As of October 16, 2021, PRC has already tested 4,635,902 swab and saliva samples in its 13 operational molecular laboratories nationwide. That is an astounding 21% of tests conducted in the entire country.