Rapid establishment of laboratory diagnostics for the novel coronavirus SARS-CoV-2 in Bavaria, Germany, February 2020
Regina Konrad, Ute Eberle, Alexandra Dangel, Bianca Treis, Anja Berger, Katja Bengs, Volker Fingerle, Bernhard Liebl, Nikolaus Ackermann, Andreas Sing
Abstract
The need for timely establishment of diagnostic assays arose when Germany was confronted with the first travel-associated outbreak of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) in Europe. We describe our laboratory experiences during a large contact tracing investigation, comparing previously published real-time RT-PCR assays in different PCR systems and a commercial kit. We found that assay performance using the same primers and probes with different PCR systems varied and the commercial kit performed well.
Topics & Concepts
Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2)Contact tracingCoronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19)Virology2019-20 coronavirus outbreakOutbreakCoronavirusMedicineCoronavirus InfectionsBetacoronavirusPathologyInfectious disease (medical specialty)DiseaseSARS-CoV-2 and COVID-19 ResearchSARS-CoV-2 detection and testingCOVID-19 epidemiological studies