PROFESSOR LUKE O’NEILL has praised the effectiveness of antigen testing after he was diagnosed with Covid-19.
The immunologist said he had contracted the virus from a close contact last week, but said he was feeling “pretty good” and did not have severe symptoms.
Speaking on RTÉ’s Today with Claire Byrne, O’Neill said the self-administered test revealed he was Covid positive “within a second” of taking it.
'I'm pretty good actually...'
— Today with Claire Byrne (@TodaywithClaire) December 13, 2021
Prof @laoneill111 tells #TodayCB about testing positive for Covid 19.
He was deemed a close contact, his antigen test was positive and he followed up with a PCR test. He received his booster the day before he found out.
“It just shows the power of antigen testing in a way. It came up very quick and I could stay home and that’s what the testing is all about,” he said.
O’Neill said he was “amazed as an immunologist” by the speed of the diagnosis.
Within two seconds, the thing had moved up the window. The band appeared immediately. So whether I was a strong positive or not, it came up very quickly.
“The guideline is to wait 15 minutes and see if a band comes up, but certainly within a few seconds, my band had come up.”
O’Neill said he received his booster a day before he was diagnosed with Covid, which he said would help boost his immune system along with his previous vaccinations.
He encouraged everyone to take up the opportunity to receive a booster vaccine, calling it “mission one” against the Omicron variant.
The Department of Health has confirmed that four further Omicron cases have been detected in Ireland, bringing the total number of cases linked with the variant here to ten.
O’Neill said he believes the variant will become the dominant strain of the virus here in the next two to four weeks as it is “probably three times as transmissible” as the Delta variant.
He also said that he thinks the gap between the second dose of a vaccine and a booster dose should be reduced from five months to three months, as has been done in the UK.
“Three months is good for boosting, you get a good response after three months. Three months should be the rule now, stop the five months time limit and go for three months for definite to get it done quickly,” he said.
He said that he would like to see those aged over 40 receive their booster dose “in the next few days” and that immunocompromised children, especially those with siblings, should be vaccinated “as soon as we can”.
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