Following the recent news that LabCorp has launched its neutralizing antibody test for the SARS-CoV-2 virus;

Dominic Tong, Medical Device Analyst at GlobalData, a leading data and analytics company, offers his view:

“LabCorp’s neutralizing antibody assay, which unlike most currently available antibody tests assesses antibody efficacy, represents an important step forward in the fight against COVID-19. However, there is still much to learn regarding COVID-19 immunity. For example, in a recent study published in Nature Medicine, Long and colleagues found that antibodies in the plasma of recovered COVID-19 patients may only last a few months. Additionally, as noted in a recent letter penned by Andersson and colleagues in BMJ, it is still not known whether the presence of IgG-type antibodies only indicate past infection or actively confer immunity to future infection.

“As such, LabCorp’s new test is more important than ever in aiding researchers and healthcare professionals in finding answers to these questions. The test will directly assess the capability of patient plasma’s antibodies to combat the SARS-CoV-2 virus, which should provide valuable information on convalescent plasma and its potential therapeutic application in treating COVID-19 patients.

“While more innovations across all sectors of healthcare are needed to fully understand COVID-19, LabCorp’s new antibody assay shows that they remain in a strong position in the diagnostics space.”