My best guess: for detecting people who are infectious but asymptomatic, antigen tests will likely perform approximately as well with Omicron as they have with Delta. Because Omicron infections ramp up so fast, however, I’m reducing my guess for how long you can trust the results from 12 hours to 6 hours. (That is to say, if you tested negative this morning, you shouldn’t assume that you aren’t infectious this evening).
In addition to the data you cite, Abbott claims their testing shows no decrease in BinaxNOW effectiveness against Omicron. That would also be my prior. I’m curious what the FDA has found, although they’ve been coy about releasing details. I assume we’ll see more data soon.
Excellent question!
My best guess: for detecting people who are infectious but asymptomatic, antigen tests will likely perform approximately as well with Omicron as they have with Delta. Because Omicron infections ramp up so fast, however, I’m reducing my guess for how long you can trust the results from 12 hours to 6 hours. (That is to say, if you tested negative this morning, you shouldn’t assume that you aren’t infectious this evening).
In addition to the data you cite, Abbott claims their testing shows no decrease in BinaxNOW effectiveness against Omicron. That would also be my prior. I’m curious what the FDA has found, although they’ve been coy about releasing details. I assume we’ll see more data soon.