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BBC Inside Science

Testing for immunity to COVID-19 and Citizen science on BBC Radio past and present

BBC Inside Science

BBC

Technology, Science

4.51.3K Ratings

🗓️ 30 April 2020

⏱️ 32 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

This week, the Government’s target to be testing 100,000 a day for COVID-19 looks like it won’t be met. But we’ve heard about many people who experienced the virus mildly, or who’ve tested positive with no symptoms at all. If you really want to know who has had the virus, the only way to tell for certain is with an antibody, or serology, test. Describing how they work is Professor of Virology at Nottingham University, Jonathan Ball. Eleanor Riley, Professor of Immunology and Infectious Disease at Edinburgh University, explains why its so important to get the specificity and sensitivity of these tests right, and reveals what they can and can't tell us about individual and population-wide exposure to the virus. We like citizen science on BBC Inside Science, it’s an opportunity for anyone and everyone to try their hand at some scientific projects, learn about the scientific process and help researchers crunch through masses of data. Professor Chris Lintott co-founded Zooniverse, the biggest citizen science platform over a decade ago. He’s a regular on the programme telling us about the latest Muon-hunting, Penguin-counting, galaxy-searching opportunities they offer. But they’re not the only ones, Butterfly Conservation want you to help them track the timing of butterfly emergence in the UK and Fold.it are asking people to play their protein folding online game to help them find a possible cure for Covid-19. But back in the 1930’s BBC radio producer Mary Adams was running a series called ‘Science in the Making’, where listeners were invited to participate in, what would now be called ‘citizen science’ experiments. With topics as diverse as charting the timing of blackbird egg laying and deciphering the meaning of dreams, a scientist would explain their hypothesis and ask the audience for help. Allan Jones, a senior lecturer in computing and communications from the Open University has been digging into the BBC’s earliest public science experiments, and the woman who decided to broadcast them. Presenter – Marnie Chesterton Producers – Fiona Roberts and Beth Eastwood

Transcript

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0:00.0

You're about to listen to a BBC podcast and trust me you'll get there in a moment but if you're a comedy fan

0:05.2

I'd really like to tell you a bit about what we do. I'm Julie Mackenzie and I commission comedy

0:10.2

podcast at the BBC. It's a bit of a dream job really.

0:13.0

Comedy is a fantastic joyous thing to do because really you're making people laugh,

0:18.0

making people's days a bit better, helping them process, all manner of things.

0:22.0

But you know I also know that comedy is really

0:24.4

subjective and everyone has different tastes so we've got a huge range of comedy on offer

0:29.6

from satire to silly shocking to soothing profound to just general pratting about. So if you

0:36.2

fancy a laugh, find your next comedy at BBC Sounds.

0:41.0

BBC Sounds, music radio podcasts.

0:46.1

This is the podcast of BBC Radio 4's Inside Science Program

0:49.7

first broadcast on the 30th of April 2020.

0:54.0

Hello, this week we'll be delving into the archives for the first attempts at

0:59.0

doing science on the radio and also perusing your options if you fancy a little light science research

1:04.5

during your lockdown. But we start with a look at the testing options for COVID-19.

1:09.2

It's deadline day for the government's testing plan,

1:12.8

and it looks like their target of testing 100,000 a day

1:16.2

won't be met.

1:17.8

But we've heard of many people who've experienced COVID mildly,

1:21.5

or who've tested positive with no symptoms at all.

1:25.0

If you want to know what percentage of the UK have had COVID, the only way to see is an antibody or serology test.

1:33.0

And why are the antibodies there?

...

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