Breath Tests Can Be Used to Detect COVID-19: Study

COVID-19 Update: The findings raise the possibility of replacing unpleasant nasal swab tests with convenient and simple breath tests.

A medical worker arranges swab samples (File photo: AFP)

New Delhi: According to a new study conducted by researchers from the University of Gothenburg in Sweden, traces of novel coronavirus can be detected in microscopically small fluid droplets exhaled during a very short time span.

"The particles we can detect are very small-less than five micrometers in diameter-and we have here managed to capture particles with RNA virus in just a few breaths," said lead author Emilia Viklund, a doctoral student at the varsity as quoted by news agency IANS.

With the help of a research instrument developed by the publishing research team, the measurement was carried out with a smaller handheld instrument called the Breath Explor (BE).

In the study, published in the journal Influenza and Other Respiratory Viruses, three distinct methods were utilized to gather the samples: 20 typical breaths; a strategy where study subjects momentarily pause their breathing after a very deep exhalation; and a technique wherein the study subject coughed multiple times into the instrument.

The exploration shows obviously that coughing created the best breath tests gathered with PExA (8 of 25), trailed by profound breathing (3 of 25) and normal breathing (2 of 25).

"The quantity of aerosol particles we needed for the test was about one 10-millionth of the amount from nasal swab samples needed to detect viral RNA in regular respiration with PCR analysis," said Professor Anna-Carin Olin, the inventor of PExA, as reported by IANS.

"Fluid droplets that one exhales after deep breathing form largely in the small airways, where it is known that the virus can cause great damage. As a result, it would be exciting to further study the findings in the exhaled air in relation to disease progression," she added.

The discoveries likewise raise the possibility of replacing unpleasant nasal swab tests with convenient and simple breath tests.

However, as per Olin that would extrapolate the findings excessively far.

"Methods for studying aerosol particles can be a good way of complementing established methods of measuring and monitoring Covid-19. In general, we can say that analysis of exhaled air has great potential for studying the spread of infection and where the virus is in the respiratory tract," Viklund said.

(With agency inputs)