Colleges lead on COVID-19 testing as Omicron surges

Since the earliest days of the COVID-19 pandemic, colleges and universities have played a key role in providing testing and other healthcare resources — not just on campus, but in their local communities. As cases surge as the third year of the pandemic begins, many colleges are using their resources and intelligence in innovative new ways to increase their support for local communities struggling to survive an ever-evolving disease.

A critical component in the fight to contain COVID-19 has been testing, which has prompted numerous colleges to develop testing sites on campus or in the broader community, including historically underserved areas that often have populations of exposed key workers.

Universities as test centers

“Given the impact this virus is having on individuals, we were very concerned about making sure individuals in our surrounding community have access to testing,” said Tanya Tatum, director of student health services at Florida A&M University in Tallahassee.

Florida A&M set up a test site on campus in April 2021, initially serving 200 people per day. That capacity was soon expanded, and now the college, which has around 9,000 students, has administered more than 586,000 COVID tests. It’s all part of the mission for the historically black college in a minority neighborhood.

“We wanted to make sure that the African American community, minority communities, the lower socio-economic segment of the community here in Tallahassee, had access to testing services,” Tatum said. “We’re probably the most important proving ground in town now. In the beginning, people came here from all over the world. We had people from surrounding counties, other states.”

Arizona State University also set up testing sites in the early days of the pandemic. Now, almost two years later, ASU has processed 1.2 million tests for COVID-19.

“When we first started opening up our testing in April 2020, the first groups we started testing with were high priority groups in the community,” said Joshua LaBaer, ​​executive director of the Biodesign Institute at ASU, who found that essential workers were among the very first tested.

Testing at ASU continues; The university has partnered with the state to provide COVID-19 testing sites for underserved communities in high-need areas. Finally, LaBaer said testing remains crucial as the coronavirus continues to spread despite the use of vaccines.

“The best way to prevent spread right now is to get tested regularly. You can’t rely on the fact that you’ve been vaccinated or that you’ve had it before to know you’ll never get it again because a lot of people get breakthrough cases,” LaBaer said.

Universities as testing innovators

In addition to serving as testing sites, some colleges also play the role of innovators developing new technologies to help contain COVID-19. ASU is one such example, running saliva-based COVID-19 tests developed by its own Biodesign Institute.

The tests essentially consist of a screw-top tube and a straw. Users spit through the straw into the tube, which LaBaer says provides a useful saliva sample that can then be processed in a lab with a turnaround time of 24 to 48 hours. The simplicity of the design, he adds, made it easy to mass produce tests even with persistent supply chain issues.

The design is also less invasive than traditional nasal swab tests, LaBaer said.

While ASU was developing its saliva-based tests, scientists across the country at Brown University were also working on an alternative COVID-19 test.

Will Fairbrother, a biology professor at Brown University, developed a test called “The Bubbler” that focuses on breath samples, making it less invasive than nose tests. The bubbler, simplified, resembles a hookah that treats human breath as a biosample.

“The bubbler is just a simple diagnostic test for COVID,” Fairbrother said. “It’s a portable device and you breathe through a straw and it bubbles through an enzymatic reaction mixture that’s in this kind of oil emulsion. When you have COVID on your breath, it converts the RNA directly into DNA, which is analyzed by a conventional PCR [polymerase chain reaction] Method.”

In addition to exhaled air, The Bubbler can also measure ambient air. That means it could be used in hospitals and office buildings to detect the presence of COVID-19.

After a clinical study at a local hospital, Fairbrother published a paper on The Bubbler. Now hoping to bring this breath-based test to the masses, he’s applying for an emergency use authorization from the Food and Drug Administration, a process he says is ongoing.

Even if COVID-19 transitions from the pandemic to the endemic stage, testing is likely to remain.

“It wouldn’t surprise me at all if there was a role for testing that extended into the future,” Fairbrother said.

Universities as good neighbors

The impact of the coronavirus was felt in many college towns in the early days of the pandemic, as colleges switched to distance learning en masse, leaving some towns without a population to serve as a vital economic engine. The importance of the town dress connection has perhaps never been more evident as restaurants and store fronts in college towns struggle to recover. But beyond the economic spark, experts point out that colleges provide value to local communities in many other ways, particularly as resource centers and partners in the area’s health.

“FAMU takes service to the community very seriously. It’s part of who we are and what we do,” Tatum said. “We are a historically black college and have a calling to address the issues and concerns of minority and underserved communities. It’s all part of our mission.”

At ASU, LaBaer shares these views. Colleges usually make for good neighbors, he said, emphasizing the importance of contributing to the community that institutions call home.

“We are part of the communities that we live in,” LaBaer said. “And I think we have a responsibility to participate in that community. We are not just ivory towers where knowledge is created and published in obscure journals. We have a responsibility to be part of that community and to share that knowledge with that community on the ground.”

source https://www.bisayanews.com/2022/01/25/colleges-lead-on-covid-19-testing-as-omicron-surges/