“COVID19 PCR tests are scientifically meaningless.”
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Nurse Tanya Markos administers a coronavirus test on patient Juan Ozoria at a mobile COVID-19 testing unit on July 2, 2020, in Lawrence, Mass. (AP)
COVID-19 tests are not ‘scientifically meaningless’
If Your Time is short
Polymerase chain reaction (PCR) tests are among the most common and reliable ways to test for the coronavirus.
These tests look for the genetic material of the coronavirus in a sample that’s typically taken from a person’s nose or throat. Health care providers use them to confirm whether someone has the disease.
The United States has ramped up its COVID-19 testing capacity this summer in an effort to slow the spread of the virus. Some bloggers and Facebook users say that’s a mistake.
In a June 27 article, a website called OffGuardian wrote that the tests many health care providers use to diagnose COVID-19 are "scientifically meaningless."
"These PCR tests are meaningless as a diagnostic tool to determine an alleged infection by a supposedly new virus called SARS-CoV-2," reads the article, which has been shared more than thousands of times on Facebook.
The article was flagged as part of Facebook’s efforts to combat false news and misinformation on its News Feed. (Read more about our partnership with Facebook.) It has also been copy-pasted into text posts, which have also been shared thousands of times.
(Screenshot from Facebook)
OffGuardian was launched in 2015. The site’s name comes from the fact that its founders were all "banned from the Guardian’s ‘Comment is Free’ sections," according to its about section.
OffGuardian has a track record of publishing conspiracy theories and Russian propaganda, so we wanted to take a closer look at its claim about COVID-19 testing.
The article is inaccurate — polymerase chain reaction (PCR) tests are among the most common and reliable ways to test for the coronavirus. Similar claims have circulated, and have been fact-checked, since March.
There are three main coronavirus tests: diagnostic, antibody and antigen. Diagnostic tests, also known as PCR tests, look for the genetic material of the coronavirus in a sample that’s typically taken from a person’s nose or throat. Health care providers and public health officials use them to confirm whether someone has the disease.
In a fact sheet for its PCR test, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says the test is "designed to detect the virus that causes COVID-19 in respiratory specimens, for example nasal or oral swabs."
