How accurate are lateral flow tests?

Sign up to our free Living Well email for advice on living a happier, healthier and longer life Live your life healthier and happier with our free weekly Living Well newsletter Live your life healthier and happier with our free weekly Living Well newsletter SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Thus, they are a very good first line of inquiry, to be followed up with confirmation via the more sensitive PCR test.” A study published in the Clinical Epidemiology journal in October 2021 from researchers at University College London, Liverpool University, Harvard University and the University of Bath found that lateral flow tests are more than 80 per cent effective at detecting any level of Covid-19 infection and are more than 90 per cent effective at detecting Covid when people are at their most infectious. “When reading lateral flow test results, two lines through both the ‘C’ and ‘T’, even faint lines, indicate the test is positive,” a Public Health England spokesperson says. Public Health England says lateral flow tests and polymerase chain reaction tests have “different roles to play” in controlling the virus, so we can’t directly compare them. “Lateral flow tests are less likely to return a positive result outside the infectious window.” A PCR, on the other hand, is used to confirm or deny a suspected case of Covid-19.