Professor Martin Cormican:

On the first one, everybody accepts that antigen tests applied to people who are asymptomatic will detect some people. PCR will detect more of them. I will go back again to the filter issue. The filter one uses with an antigen test will let more through than the filter one uses with a PCR test. In any particular application people may choose to use one type of filter or the other but we have very clear evidence, from the work that has been done, the validation that has been done here, that if 100 people who are infected are tested with an antigen test, at most 60% to 65% will be detected and the other 35%, which would be detected by PCR, will not be detected. Thus one chooses the filter one wants to use. This is not a matter of opinion. Every study I have seen done in any country will show that antigen testing will miss about a third of asymptomatic people who are likely to be infectious at the time. People may have all sorts of opinions but I would pick up what Dr. Glynn says: what is the evidence? Sometimes the evidence is very uncomfortable and sometimes I wish the evidence was different as well. However, what we have to do is tell the committee what the evidence is. If anyone can find publications by peer-reviewed scientists that show what I have just told the committee is wrong then I will change my opinion but I have tried and I cannot find them.