Students and staff snap up more than 10,000 antigen tests at UCC

The UniCov project in UCC, a SARS-CoV-2 rapid testing research programme, has grown from between 500 to 600 volunteers in October to 1,700

The tests were distributed to students from the Student Hub where the UniCov project, a SARS-CoV-2 rapid testing research programme in place across four college campuses, has a base.

More than 10,200 antigen tests were distributed at University College Cork (UCC) this week as students and staff headed home for Christmas.

Tests were distributed to students from the Student Hub where the UniCov project, a SARS-CoV-2 rapid testing research programme in place across four college campuses, has a base.

“The hope is that they’d use them going home so that if they were asymptomatic, or symptomatic, you could detect it and be wary of going home to older parents and people who are at risk,” said John Mac Sharry of the Schools of Microbiology and Medicine at UCC.

Mr Mac Sharry is also the UniCov co-principal investigator. The kits, which include five tests each, were provided through a funding call from the Department of Further and Higher Education.

Over 10,200 free Antigen tests, funded by DFHERIS, were given out by the excellent UCC UniCoV team in the last few days. A special mention to John O’Leary who braved the cold over the last few days @UCC @profmaryhorgan @SimonHarrisTD @StephenUCCPharm @johbees #ProjectUniCoV

— John Mac Sharry (@johnmacsharry) December 23, 2021

At the beginning of the month, the €9m fund was announced by Simon Harris, the Minister for Further and Higher Education, for colleges to provide students with free tests. “The antigen tests are great because they tell you if you are infectious," Mr Mac Sharry said. 

"That’s the benefit of them, they are not as sensitive as the PCR but they are very good, especially if you take them one or two days in a row.”

Everyone is slightly different in terms of infection with the virus, he added. "Someone might get it and have a very rapid response, shedding it quite fast. Other people might be incubating then for a week. That is the difficulty with this virus. I think the antigen tests are great for that reason, that you can have someone take responsibility for themselves, and isolate." 

The UniCov project has continued to grow at UCC, from between 500 to 600 volunteers taking part in the free rapid testing program in October to approximately 1,700.  

"In November, our positivity rate went way up. Overall, we found 30 [asympomatic] positives since September, and 15 of those were in November. The rate of infection has gone up." 

The lab has also worked with a team in the Netherlands that designed a rapid test to detect Omicron in samples. "We found Omicron positive in our samples from the end of November."