TY - JOUR
T1 - Evaluation of a surrogate virus neutralization test for high-throughput serosurveillance of SARS-CoV-2
AU - Mariën, Joachim
AU - Michiels, Johan
AU - Heyndrickx, Leo
AU - Nkuba-Ndaye, Antoine
AU - Ceulemans, Ann
AU - Bartholomeeusen, Koen
AU - Madinga, Joule
AU - Mbala-Kingebeni, Placide
AU - Vanlerberghe, Veerle
AU - Ahuka-Mundeke, Steve
AU - Wang, Lin-Fa
AU - Ariën, Kevin K
N1 - NPP; OGOA; Copyright © 2021 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
PY - 2021
Y1 - 2021
N2 - High-throughput serological tests that can detect neutralizing antibodies against SARS-CoV-2 are desirable for serosurveillance and vaccine efficacy evaluation. Although the conventional neutralization test (cVNT) remains the gold standard to confirm the presence of neutralizing antibodies in sera, the test is too labour-intensive for massive screening programs and less reproducible as live virus and cell culture is involved. Here, we performed an independent evaluation of a commercially available surrogate virus neutralization test (sVNT, GenScript cPass™) that can be done without biosafety level 3 containment in less than 2 h. When using the cVNT and a Luminex multiplex immunoassay (MIA) as reference, the sVNT obtained a sensitivity of 94 % (CI 90-96 %) on a panel of 317 immune sera that were obtained from hospitalized and mild COVID-19 cases from Belgium and a sensitivity of 88 % (CI 81-93 %) on a panel of 184 healthcare workers from the Democratic Republic of Congo. We also found strong antibody titer correlations (r
s>0.8) among the different techniques used. In conclusion, our evaluation suggests that the sVNT could be a powerful tool to monitor/detect neutralising antibodies in cohort and population studies. The technique could be especially useful for vaccine evaluation studies in sub-Saharan Africa where the basic infrastructure to perform cVNTs is lacking.
AB - High-throughput serological tests that can detect neutralizing antibodies against SARS-CoV-2 are desirable for serosurveillance and vaccine efficacy evaluation. Although the conventional neutralization test (cVNT) remains the gold standard to confirm the presence of neutralizing antibodies in sera, the test is too labour-intensive for massive screening programs and less reproducible as live virus and cell culture is involved. Here, we performed an independent evaluation of a commercially available surrogate virus neutralization test (sVNT, GenScript cPass™) that can be done without biosafety level 3 containment in less than 2 h. When using the cVNT and a Luminex multiplex immunoassay (MIA) as reference, the sVNT obtained a sensitivity of 94 % (CI 90-96 %) on a panel of 317 immune sera that were obtained from hospitalized and mild COVID-19 cases from Belgium and a sensitivity of 88 % (CI 81-93 %) on a panel of 184 healthcare workers from the Democratic Republic of Congo. We also found strong antibody titer correlations (r
s>0.8) among the different techniques used. In conclusion, our evaluation suggests that the sVNT could be a powerful tool to monitor/detect neutralising antibodies in cohort and population studies. The technique could be especially useful for vaccine evaluation studies in sub-Saharan Africa where the basic infrastructure to perform cVNTs is lacking.
U2 - 10.1016/j.jviromet.2021.114228
DO - 10.1016/j.jviromet.2021.114228
M3 - A1: Web of Science-article
C2 - 34224754
SN - 0166-0934
VL - 297
JO - Journal of Virological Methods
JF - Journal of Virological Methods
M1 - 114228
ER -