@pjvanerp Ok, see if I can save some time later in the week with this ongoing nonsense: there is a group that claims that the original PCR assay developed by Victor Corman and Christian Drosten and validated by a collaboration of expert labs does not detect a new virus at all.

They argue that this is because the PCR primers also detect SARS

Fortunately, virologists know this ……viruses do indeed have parts in their genetic code that are conserved. That is actually used to classify them, and it can come in handy when designing a test to pick up all variants of a family of viruses.

See an example where this knowledge is used for design of a test that can pick up ALL coronaviruses https://t.co/NCoN3sMR14 . This type of test was also used when this virus first emerged.

So yes, when designing a test, selection of primers is key (as anyone involved in diagnostic virology knows) https://t.co/6p8sKCft7W In the paper, the sequence conservation among a highly selected sublineage of SARS-like viruses was used for primer selection.