Dubai permits saliva-based COVID-19 testing for children

Our Correspondent

Children need not worry about nasal swabs to return to school as the Dubai Health Authority (DHA) facilities and screening centres have adopted saliva-based COVID-19 testing for children aged 3 to 16 years.

The cost of the test is Dh150, which is the same price of a PCR test in Dubai; the results are available within 24 hours.

The move is based on research and evidence; a joint study by the Mohammed Bin Rashid University of Medicine and Health Sciences and DHA found the test to be diagnostically accurate. The research team had taken both saliva and nasal swabs from 476 children who went for Covid-10 screening to DHA facilities. The samples were tested for SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes the coronavirus disease.

The study found that saliva could be used for detecting the virus with 87.7 per cent sensitivity and 98.5 per cent specificity. The positive and negative predictive values for saliva tests were 92.2 per cent and 97.6 per cent respectively.

“These results show that saliva is a useful diagnostic specimen for Covid-19 screening in children,” the DHA said.
The study is the world’s largest for saliva-based Covid-19 testing in children. The study received approval from the Human Research Ethics Committee of the DHA and has been submitted for peer-review publication.