A SARS-CoV-2 surrogate virus neutralization test (sVNT) based on antibody-mediated blockage of ACE2-spike (RBD) protein-protein interaction

At this critical moment of the international response to the COVID-19 outbreak, there is an urgent need for a robust serological test to detect neutralizing antibodies to SARS-CoV-2. Such a test is not only important for contact tracing, but for determining infection rate, herd immunity and predicted humoral protection. The current gold standard is a virus neuralization test (VNT) requiring live virus and a biosafety level 3 (BSL3) laboratory. On the other hand, the ELISA- or lateral flow-based assays are for the detection of binding antibodies, which does not directly correlate with their neutralizing ability. Here we report a SARS-CoV-2 surrogate virus neutralization test (sVNT) that is designed to detect total neutralizing antibodies in an isotype- and species-independent manner. Our simple and rapid test is based on antibody-mediated blockage of virus-host interaction between the ACE2 receptor protein and the receptor binding domain (RBD) of the viral spike protein. The test has been validated with two COVID-19 patient cohorts in two different countries, achieving 100% specificity and 95-100% sensitivity and is capable of differentiating antibody responses from other known human coronaviruses. Importantly, the sVNT does not require BSL3 containment, thereby making the test immediately accessible to the global community.