I really think there's a lot more to do in this saliva trial than just test people, update instructions to "spit into cassette".
I would consider these points below:
- They have to find positive patients
- Get positive patients to produce saliva sample in different ways (because remember, instructions HAS to be clear, no buts/ifs)
- Analyse the different results based on the different ways of sample collection
- Possibly do another trial using the strongest set of results/instruction
- Do all of the above again, for shallow nasal, for oral swab etc
I would even say the instruction will be so specific, coupled with multiple diagrams on how to draw the sample from the throat. To make sure everyone can understand, because even though these samples will be taken under supervision of health professionals, they cannot control where the patient gets the same from.
Sometimes this leads me to think if a suspected positive patient wants to fake their results to go travel/event etc, they could try to draw sample from the front of their mouth but pretend they are doing it right, to have less chance of being detected. Which means if EuGeni was ever to be used for border screening, I think swabs will have to be used, to ensure samples are collected accurately, while the saliva sampling will be for workplaces where people have no need to fake results.
Therefore, I think this current trial will result in us having an additional 2-3 sets of sampling methods, with recommendation for each based on use cases, which is why it is taking longer.
