New York (AFP)

Elon Musk, the tumultuous boss of Tesla and SpaceX, announced Thursday that he had carried out four antigen tests to find out if he had Covid-19 and had received two positive and two negative results.

"Something extremely bizarre is going on," he wrote on Twitter.

"Have been tested for Covid four times today. Two tests came back negative, two came back positive. Same machine, same test, same nurse," he added, specifying that they were tests antigenic.

This form of testing has the advantage of not requiring laboratory analysis and of giving a result in about fifteen minutes.

But antigenic tests are less precise than so-called RT-PCR diagnostic tests: the former identify the proteins of the virus when the latter detect its genetic material.

Mr. Musk explains on his Twitter account that he has experienced the usual symptoms of a cold - mild sniffles, cough and a slight fever.

He plans to do RT-PCR tests at another lab, the results of which should arrive "in about 24 hours."

To an internet user who wondered if this could explain the peak of Covid-19 cases currently observed in the United States, the official simply replied: "If this happens to me, it must happen to others."

Known for his flashy statements, Mr. Musk split in mid-March with a tweet saying: "Based on current trends, (we will) probably have close to zero new cases also in the United States by the end of April".

He had subsequently spoken out several times in the spring against the measures intended to limit the pandemic, going so far as to qualify as "fascist" the confinement which had led to the temporary closure of its plant in California.

Its space company, SpaceX, will launch four astronauts from Florida to the International Space Station on Saturday.

Mr Musk was in the control room during SpaceX's inaugural two astronaut launch in May, but the NASA chief stressed Friday that health protocol ruled out the presence of anyone who tested positive at the Kennedy Space Center.

"Our policy is that this person should go into quarantine or self-isolate. So we anticipate that will be the case, and we expect SpaceX to trace contact cases appropriately," said Jim Bridenstine, administrator. of the space agency, during a press conference.

The astronauts have been in quarantine since October 31, and the NASA chief did not want to predict whether there was a risk of postponing the launch if possible contact cases were identified.

© 2020 AFP