S’pore Coming Out With a Breathalyser Test to Diagnose COVID-19; It’s 90% Accurate so Far

If you think breathalyser tests were only going to be used to see if you’ve been drink driving, think again.

The good news is that a local medtech start-up has developed a breathalyser test to detect COVID-19 infections.

The bad news is… the breathalyser’s still a prototype.

Results in 60 seconds

The breathalyser is developed by Breathonix, which is a spin-off company from the National University of Singapore (NUS).

During a pilot clinical trial conducted at the National Centre for Infectious Diseases (NCID) which involved 180 patients, it achieved an accuracy rate of more than 90%. While this might seem good enough for most people, the researchers are still in the midst of making it even better and more accurate by using the data collected during the next phases of trial.

Still, getting your results in just a minute is a lot faster than the “traditional” swab test where test results will take a day.

Earlier this year in March, local medical technology firm Biolidics Limited developed a test kit where COVID-19 could be detected in less than 10 minutes.

These test kits are able to detect the virus with an accuracy of more than 95% using serum, plasma, or whole blood samples.

Easier to Administer

According to Dr Jia Zhunan, an NUS graduate and chief executive of Breathonix, the breathalyser test could be a real “game-changer” when it comes to Singapore’s fight against COVID-19.

This breathalyser test is easier to administer which means it does not require specially trained staff or laboratory processing usually required for polymerase chain reaction (PCR) tests.

“Results are generated in real-time, making it an attractive solution for mass screening, especially in areas with high human traffic,” Dr Jia added.

How the breathalyser test works

Now onto the more complex science-y stuff.

First off, you have to know that there are these things called volatile organic compounds (VOCs) in your breaths.

A normal and healthy human’s VOC signature is different from someone who is sick. I guess you can say it’s like comparing a normal person’s lungs to that of a smoker’s.

The Breathoix breathalyser test starts when you blow into a disposable mouthpiece connected to a high-precision breath sampler.

The exhaled breath is collected and fed into a cutting-edge mass spectrometer for measurement. A machine learning software analyses the VOC profile and generates the result in less than a minute.

Or if that was too cheem for you, here’s a video instead.

Promising but needs more work

While this all seems very simple, some of us might be wondering why can’t this be the “standard” test for all COVID-19 cases.

I guess the answer is pretty obvious: it’s still very new.

NCID clinical director, Dr Shawn Vasoo stated that the breathalyser test may serve as a screening test but a polymerase chain reaction test will still be required to really double confirm if someone really is infected with COVID-19.

In fact, we wrote an entire article about the other reasons why test kits which give results in minutes are not used in Singapore.

You can also watch this video to the end to know more about the two main types of COVID-19 tests (and please subscribe to our YouTube channel for more informative videos):