The British government will seek refunds for millions of coronavirus test kits purchased from China, after a study of the products found them to be unreliable for use with most patients.
Professor John Bell, coordinator of coronavirus testing for Public Health England, said Monday that the antibody tests are not reliable when used on any patients who do not qualify as severely ill—i.e. most people being tested.
In a blog post, the University of Oxford academic explained: “Sadly, the tests we have looked at to date have not performed well.” He added, “We see many false negatives and we also see false positives…This is not a good result for test suppliers or for us.”
