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Coronavirus testing could reach as low as $30 person, 'if we drive up demand': Medical Expert

Dr. Joan Coker, Testing for America Advisory Council, joins The First Trade with Alexis Christoforous and Brian Sozzi to discuss rapid testing's role in college students returning to campus and much more.

Video Transcript

BRIAN SOZZI: While coronavirus cases are still on the rise, Americans are eager to get schools and college campuses back up and running. Some HBCU, or historically black colleges and universities, are getting ahead of the game. Nonprofit organization Testing for America is helping to implement regular free testing with quick results for a handful of HBCU campuses. And they've got a well thought out plan out how to get handled positive test results.

Joining us now to discuss is Dr. Joan Coker. She's on the Testing for America Advisory Council. Doctor, good to see you this morning. Walk us through this. How does it-- does it exactly work?

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JOAN COKER: Thank you so much for having us. How it works is, TFA has done the work of looking through all the research. And we've come so far since March. We now understand the entire genome-- 30,000 base pairs associated with this virus.

As a result of that, we applied that knowledge to an age-old technique of sequencing. And we are able to ramp up with different corporations very quickly, scale up quickly, to the tune of maybe 100,000 tests a day. And they can be processed with a quick yes or no in 24 to 34 hours.

For me, as a physician-- surgeon-- what's most exciting is that it's a quick and easy test-- self-administered test. These students just swab the front of their nose. No more brain tickler. That's done.

Swab the front of the nose. 10 seconds on about each side. Drop it in a test tube, goes in a baggie. That batch goes out. We get a yes or no with a 1% false negative rate.

ALEXIS CHRISTOFOROUS: Doctor, how frequently [INAUDIBLE]? We had a guest on earlier, Dr. Koh of Harvard, saying that [INAUDIBLE] every other week for students. That seems [INAUDIBLE], but is that what we need right now to keep this virus at bay?

JOAN COKER: I think what's important-- I'm glad you asked that question, Alexis. Because what's important is, we're going to tailor this to each college campus. Those that are smaller, we may be able to get away with a test a week, test every two weeks. We've got to get started with frequent testing.

And you're right. That may mean twice a week to know exactly where the hot spots. We're working with one of our lead epidemiologists. Her name is Blythe Adamson.

Dr. Adamson was part of-- and is-- continues to be-- on the White House task force. But also, she helped create the NBA bubble. So she's analyzing the data along with another analyst.

And they're tailor-making this for each college campus. Because each one is different. And the needs are different.

BRIAN SOZZI: Doctor, where are you getting this tests from?

JOAN COKER: Oh, lord. That's a great question. We are agnostic to vendor.

So we're just looking for that scaling partner that can get us to the finish line. And we're partnering that school with that vendor. So we have a host of vendors that get the technology, easily understand it. And that's what we're doing. We're working with each vendor, each university.

ALEXIS CHRISTOFOROUS: Doctor, what [INAUDIBLE]?

JOAN COKER: For the tests right now in this country, the way we're doing business, it's about $140 per person per test. That's expensive. But as we drive up demand, which is what we're trying to do, and getting results back timely, that means you can trace and track and respond, which is most important, efficiently.

And if we drive up demand-- and right now, our test is running about $50 per person. And we're trying to take that demand up-- open all businesses, not just schools-- all businesses. And if we can do that, we can take that test down to about $30 per person. That's the good news. We could use a little good news right now. [LAUGHS]