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US Ambassador to South Korea Harry Harris, who has apparently expressed his intention to resign after the US presidential election in November. (Hankyoreh archives)

Pooling methods involving the testing up to 10 samples at a time are likely to be introduced as a way of quickly determining whether novel coronavirus infections have arisen in certain populations. Disease control authorities plan to enable the swift identification of patients and prevention of additional transmissions by allowing this approach to be used in facilities such as convalescent hospitals and nursing homes that present a high risk of cluster infections.

The Korea Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (KCDC) and the Korean Society for Laboratory Medicine (KSLM) announced on Apr. 9 that a “pooling protocol suited to the South Korean laboratory situation has been completed based on 650 evaluation tests.” Under the pooling method, samples from several people are mixed into a single sample for testing; if a positive result is detected, the remaining samples are retested individually. The approach is useful in identifying infections in high-risk populations such as residents in nursing homes, who do not present symptoms but require regular testing for infectious disease prevention.

Disease control authorities explained that pooling is not used as a test for confirming coronavirus infections, but only for the purpose of monitoring for disease in high-risk populations where no symptoms have been detected.

Health professionals have been stressing the need for pooling as a way of effectively conducting full-scale examinations for vulnerable facilities presenting a high infection risk, including convalescent hospitals, nursing homes, and psychiatric hospitals.

“It’s a way of substantially lowering the costs and time needed for testing while maintaining testing accuracy,” explained KSLM president Kwon Gye-cheol.

Meanwhile, the Core Protein Resources Service Center at the Daegu Gyeongbuk Institute of Science and Technology (DGIST) announced the same day that it had “developed a diagnostic reagent capable of returning coronavirus testing times to the 20-30 minute range, which we have provided to the diagnostic kit production company Mmonitor to begin production.” The time represents a large decrease from the existing diagnostic kits, which will require four to six hours to produce testing results.

The South Korean government also announced plans to begin testing the efficacy of one coronavirus treatment and two vaccines on monkeys and other primates early next month.

By Park Da-hae and Koo Bon-kwon, staff reporters

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