Standard operating procedures for SARS-CoV-2 detection by a clinical diagnostic RT-LAMP assay

Buck, M. D.; Poirier, E. Z.; Cardoso, A.; Frederico, B.; Canton, J.; Barrell, S.; Beale, R.; Byrne, R.; Caidan, S.; Crawford, M.; Cubitt, L.; Gamblin, S.; Gandhi, S.; Goldstone, R.; Grant, P. R.; Gulati, K.; Hindmarsh, S.; Howell, M.; Hubank, M.; Instrell, R.; Jiang, M.; Kassiotis, G.; Lu, W.-T.; MacRae, J. I.; Martini, I.; Miller, D.; Moore, D.; Nastouli, E.; Nicod, J.; Nightingale, L.; Olsen, J.; Oomatia, A.; O'Reilly, N.; Rideg, A.; Song, O.-R.; Strange, A.; Swanton, C.; Turajlic, S.; Walker, P. A.; Wu, M.; Reis e Sousa, C.; Consortium, Crick COVID-19

The ongoing pandemic of SARS-CoV-2 calls for rapid and cost-effective methods to accurately identify infected individuals. The vast majority of patient samples is assessed for viral RNA presence by RT-qPCR. Our biomedical research institute, in collaboration between partner hospitals and an accredited clinical diagnostic laboratory, established a diagnostic testing pipeline that has reported on more than 40,000 RT-qPCR results since its commencement at the beginning of April 2020. However, due to ongoing demand and competition for critical resources, alternative testing strategies were sought. In this work, we present a clinically-validated standard operating procedure (SOP) for high-throughput SARS- CoV-2 detection by RT-LAMP in 25 minutes that is robust, reliable, repeatable, sensitive, specific, and inexpensive.