Burlington Reporter

North Carolina Sen. Ralph Hise (R-Madison) recently commended the eventual delivery of rapid test kits from Abbott Laboratories.

"Excited to hear President Trump's announcement that starting this week 100 million Abbott Laboratories BinaxNOW rapid point-of-care tests will begin going to the states free of charge. North Carolina will receive 3,150,000 of these tests," Hise wrote in a Sept. 29 Facebook post. "These tests could play an important role in helping the state to reopen and kids to return to school. I look forward to hearing from Gov. Cooper how these tests will be utilized across our state."

Health experts have said that rapid testing could help slow the spread of COVID-19 since results are known faster than the more accurate nasal swab. However, it is the accuracy of these tests that also has health experts concerned. 

That accuracy of Abbott Laboratories' rapid test was called into question Oct. 2, when President Trump said that he and his wife, Melania, tested positive for COVID-19 after senior advisor Hope Hicks did as well. The president is tested daily but did not receive a positive test until late in the week. The day before Hicks started showing COVID-19 symptoms, she had tested negative. 

In a statement, Abbott Laboratories said that "As people process today's news, it's helpful to keep in mind that tests discover the presence of coronavirus once there's enough viral material in a person to be able to detect it. No test detects the virus immediately after the person becomes infected." The company posted the statement to the company's Twitter account, ABC 8 WMTW reported on Oct. 3. 

Abbott Labs said on its website that the test produces a result in 15 minutes and started shipping them in September, with plans to increase production in October to 50 million per month.