(Almost) As Accurate as PCR and Faster Than the Lateral Flow Test?

The 'holy grail' of a fast and accurate test for determining if someone has a Covid-19 infection, may have a candidate. The Cor Dial1 test is at an early stage of development and requires lots more testing, before it can be considered for approval. Initial studies by researchers at the Universities of Lille and Marseilles, however, sound very promising (https://www.ctvnews.ca/health/coronavirus/french-researchers-trial-more-accurate-fast-covid-19-test-1.5322033). The Cor Dial1 technique grafts tiny nanobodies, incorporating the especially stable Covid-19 antibodies from Camellids (camels, llamas etc), on to the surfaces of electrodes. The electrodes are a component of the testing apparatus, which looks rather like a large USB stick. When the coated electrode comes into contact with the spike protein from the Sars-CoV-2 virus, the electric current passing across it is changed. The test apparatus can then be plugged into a smartphone, where the current shows up as a signal on a graph, confirming the presence of the spike protein. The whole procedure takes less than 10 minutes. Initial trials suggest the Cor Dial1 test has 90% of the accuracy of the 'gold standard' Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR) test. PCR, however, requires several hours in a laboratory to get a result. The Lateral Flow test (much used in the UK) takes 20-30 minutes but has nothing like the accuracy of the PCR test. If Cor Dial1 passes all its hurdles, we may have a test with excellent accuracy, delivering test results in the 'field', within 10 minutes. Such a test would have lots of applications. Its results could even be used to automatically warn contacts of the tested subject.