Should RT-PCR be considered a gold standard in the diagnosis of COVID-19?
Moustapha Dramé 1, Maturin Tabue Teguo 2, Emeline Proye 3, Fanny Hequet 3, Maxime Hentzien 4, Lukshe Kanagaratnam 5, Lidvine Godaert 3

J Med Virol 2020 Nov;92(11):2312-2313. doi: 10.1002/jmv.25996. Epub 2020 Jul 14.

Abstract
To face the new Covid‐19 pandemic, the need for early and accurate diagnosis of the disease among suspected cases quickly became obvious for effective management, and for better control of the spread of the disease in the population. Since the beginning of this disease epidemic caused by the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus‐2 (SARS‐CoV‐2), reverse transcriptase polymerase chain reaction (RT‐PCR) has routinely been used to confirm diagnosis. However, several authors have pointed out the poor performance of this technique, particularly in terms of sensitivity.1,2


Keywords: COVID-19; RT-PCR; diagnosis; gold standard; serology.

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