Covid-19 discussion and humor thread [Was: CDC says don't touch your face to avoid Covid19...Vets to the rescue!

[HappyDays]

2 minutes ago, teef said:

oh happy that sucks.  would he have to wear the mask?  and you're right...the kids who need services are the ones who are going to suffer.  we're still not even sure how the kids opting out are going to be handled.  in some suburbs, it's my understanding that if you choose not to go to school, you get a curriculum to follow, but not necessarily any online guidance.  just the parents and the guideline.  that just doesn't sound like it works.  are there any other institutions he can go to.  i know our daughter's day care is starting a kindergarten class, and i don't think they require the kids to wear the masks.  the same day care now is telling us to send the masks so the kids can get used to wearing them in school...but i'm not sure at what age they're going to require masks.  some privates won't require it for the elementary grades.

 

The current plan from the district is to mandate masks which I know will not work for him. Even if they didn't, he has asthma so we wouldn't risk him going back either way. I know young children are not as susceptible but it's not worth the risk. My wife spends most of the day doing activities with him which is going as well as it can. It is what it is. A lot of parents are in much worse positions.

[teef]

1 minute ago, HappyDays said:

 

The current plan from the district is to mandate masks which I know will not work for him. Even if they didn't, he has asthma so we wouldn't risk him going back either way. I know young children are not as susceptible but it's not worth the risk. My wife spends most of the day doing activities with him which is going as well as it can. It is what it is. A lot of parents are in much worse positions.

i don't know happy...not being able to get services for a child who really needs it is a tough one.  i feel like we're the more generic parents who want our kids to get in school education, and have to figure out care, but that's not as important as what you have to navigate through.

 

i'm sure it takes a heavy toll on you two as well.

[DCOrange]

7 hours ago, Hapless Bills Fan said:

 

The official CDC definition of a "close contact" is:

For COVID-19, a close contact is defined as any individual who was within 6 feet of an infected person for at least 15 minutes starting from 2 days before illness onset (or, for asymptomatic patients, 2 days prior to positive specimen collection) until the time the patient is isolated. 

 

And one has to start somewhere.  But I'm not aware of any convincing evidence that transmission can't occur in shorter periods of time from further away, and several lines of evidence say it can - particularly indoors where air circulation may be poor.  There's a contact tracing study from China which asserts an apartment dweller became infected by using the same elevator as an upstairs asymptomatic and negative-tested neighbor resulting in 72 infections (I would arch my eyebrows at that, but the index patient was returning from US to China and the investigation included genomic sequencing of her virus and the virus of all the people she was said to infect and showed a unique variant).  Restaurant where people more than 2 meters apart were infected, probably by aerosol transmission.  Then there's the infection cluster in an Israeli high school, right after parents objected that it was inhumane to make the students wear masks and have the windows open during a heat wave (153 students and 26 staff).  All case studies, but so many cases are "unknown" as the source, especially in the US.

 

Here's a piece from the UK Center for Evidence Based Medicine which gives some background on the science behind the 2m rule and why it may be a poor guide for covid-19:

https://www.cebm.net/covid-19/what-is-the-evidence-to-support-the-2-metre-social-distancing-rule-to-reduce-covid-19-transmission/

 

There's also a continuum - people are more likely to get infected in the home because they spend more time there breathing the same air and touching the same surfaces, even if their actual contact time <6m is relatively limited (families that don't share meals or play board games or watch movies together, kids spend most time in own room).  Multiple short contacts and use of the same surfaces and air add up, in those circumstances.  Korean contact tracing study (during school closures and other mitigation measures) showed that people were 3x more likely to be infected at home than outside the home.  Again, remember this is during school and other closures and people asked to stay home as much as possible but the point is, transient close contacts did not produce much infection.
 

Being in the same school or on the same football team may be a more home-like than transient, though.  The person who tackled the RB may have participated in tackling them 8x, be blocked by the RB an additional 5x going close F2F for 10-15 seconds each time, maybe got in their face for some trash talk after the play several times.  So yeah, it's a short exposure, but it's far closer contact than just sitting in a meeting room.  It likely depends upon exposure to droplets and aerosols the infected person puts out and face discipline (not touching face with hands that may be contaminated).

We just don't know.  It's a giant experiment, as far as I can tell.

 

 

I wish that people were not virtually immune from learnings, and open to learning from reliable sources other than their favorite programs.

He may mean that kids seldom develop serious covid-19 illness, which is true ....but that's not the usual meaning of the word "immune" - when most of us and when medical people say "immune" they mean "uninfected, and not able to infect others".  Which the preponderance of evidence contradicts at this point for kids.

Not entirely sure what you were getting at with your response to me but in case the implication is that I learned this from a biased news source, I was watching the Fox interview live when he said it lol. I would guess CNN, MSNBC, etc. are running with him literally saying they’re immune but as I said, he corrected himself and said they’re virtually immune instead, which is still horribly misleading and dangerous.

 

He did at least acknowledge that returning to school is legitimately putting teachers in danger. 

Edited August 5, 2020 by DCOrange

[BillsFan4]

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/08/06/us/united-states-failure-coronavirus.html#click=https://t.co/PJO9fCJzP3
 

interesting read. 

[The Poojer]

[K-9]

Bill Gates offers some interesting perspectives in this interview:

 

https://apple.news/AjtLjc6FfTaaOHGEnnN7ltQ

[OldTimeAFLGuy]

….HMMM...tested positive...….then negative...….then negative a SECOND TIME......pretty reassuring confidence booster in daily numbers of "positives" reported, isn't it?......

 

Ohio Gov. DeWine tests negative for COVID-19 hours after testing positive

The second test was a PCR test administered on Thursday afternoon

By David Aaro | Fox News

 

Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine tested negative for COVID-19 on Thursday hours after testing positive before he was set to greet President Trump at the Cleveland airport, according to a statement by the governor's office.

 

Instead of meeting with Trump, DeWine returned to Columbus and was ultimately tested for coronavirus a second time.

The second test was a PCR test administered that afternoon, which his office said was "extremely sensitive, as well as specific, for the virus." His wife, Fran DeWine, and staff members also tested negative.

"The PCR tests for the Governor, First Lady, and staff were run twice," the statement said. "They came back negative the first time and came back negative when they were run on a second diagnostic platform."

His office said the PCR test was different than the rapid antigen test administered earlier in the morning as part of the standard protocol required to meet with Trump.

"We will be working with the manufacturer to have a better understanding of how the discrepancy between these two tests could have occurred," the statement added.

https://www.foxnews.com/us/ohio-gov-dewine-tests-negative-covid-19-hours-testing-positive

[Punching Bag]

42 minutes ago, OldTimeAFLGuy said:

….HMMM...tested positive...….then negative...….then negative a SECOND TIME......pretty reassuring confidence booster in daily numbers of "positives" reported, isn't it?......

 

Ohio Gov. DeWine tests negative for COVID-19 hours after testing positive

The second test was a PCR test administered on Thursday afternoon

By David Aaro | Fox News

 

Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine tested negative for COVID-19 on Thursday hours after testing positive before he was set to greet President Trump at the Cleveland airport, according to a statement by the governor's office.

 

Instead of meeting with Trump, DeWine returned to Columbus and was ultimately tested for coronavirus a second time.

 

We have smart viruses in computers and now we have them in people.

[OldTimeAFLGuy]

3 minutes ago, Limeaid said:

 

We have smart viruses in computers and now we have them in people.

 

 

....and the MSM WELL versed in malware..................

[BillsFan4]

It doesn’t really diminish my confidence in the widespread daily testing being done with the general public.
 

The way I understand it is the rapid antigen tests (the one that produced a false positive) aren’t as accurate as the PCR tests.
 

But as far as I know, I don’t think those rapid tests are that widely used in the general public. When the general public is tested for covid, I believe it’s a RT-PCR test the vast majority of the time (which is why you hear of people having to wait to get their test results vs getting them instantly like the tests used for people visiting the president).

 

https://www.eamc.org/news-and-media/a-look-at-the-three-most-common-types-of-covid-19-tests
‘A Look at the Three Most Common Types of COVID-19 Tests’

 

With PCR tests (or I believe it’s a reverse transcription PCR test in the case of covid), I believe it’s is much more difficult to get a false positive simply due to the nature of the test (the viral RNA has to be there for a reaction to happen).

 

Info on PCR testing for covid: 

 

https://discoverysedge.mayo.edu/2020/03/27/the-science-behind-the-test-for-the-covid-19-virus/

I believe @Hapless Bills Fan has addressed this topic once before. I don’t want to post incorrect info so I’ll let hapless answer (and possibly correct me....lol). 

[OldTimeAFLGuy]

1 minute ago, BillsFan4 said:

It doesn’t really diminish my confidence in the widespread daily testing being done with the general public.
 

The way I understand it is the rapid antigen tests (the one that produced a false positive) aren’t as accurate as the PCR tests.
 

But as far as I know, I don’t think those rapid tests are that widely used in the general public. When the general public is tested for covid, I believe it’s a RT-PCR test the vast majority of the time (which is why you hear of people having to wait to get their test results vs getting them instantly like the tests used for people visiting the president).

 

https://www.eamc.org/news-and-media/a-look-at-the-three-most-common-types-of-covid-19-tests
‘A Look at the Three Most Common Types of COVID-19 Tests’

 

With PCR tests (or I believe it’s a reverse transcription PCR test in the case of covid), I believe it’s is much more difficult to get a false positive simply due to the nature of the test (the viral RNA has to be there for a reaction to happen).

 

Info on PCR testing for covid: 

 

https://discoverysedge.mayo.edu/2020/03/27/the-science-behind-the-test-for-the-covid-19-virus/

I believe @Hapless Bills Fan has addressed this topic once before. I don’t want to post incorrect info so I’ll let hapless answer (and possibly correct me....lol). 

 

...just curious then as to why Ohio would rely on that test for their Governor FIRST, based on your assessment relative to accuracy?.....wouldn't that set off a statewide panic?......and then the PCR test (twice) reveals negatives......

[Hapless Bills Fan]

1 hour ago, OldTimeAFLGuy said:

….HMMM...tested positive...….then negative...….then negative a SECOND TIME......pretty reassuring confidence booster in daily numbers of "positives" reported, isn't it?......

 

Ohio Gov. DeWine tests negative for COVID-19 hours after testing positive

The second test was a PCR test administered on Thursday afternoon

By David Aaro | Fox News

 

Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine tested negative for COVID-19 on Thursday hours after testing positive before he was set to greet President Trump at the Cleveland airport, according to a statement by the governor's office.

 

Instead of meeting with Trump, DeWine returned to Columbus and was ultimately tested for coronavirus a second time.

The second test was a PCR test administered that afternoon, which his office said was "extremely sensitive, as well as specific, for the virus." His wife, Fran DeWine, and staff members also tested negative.

"The PCR tests for the Governor, First Lady, and staff were run twice," the statement said. "They came back negative the first time and came back negative when they were run on a second diagnostic platform."

His office said the PCR test was different than the rapid antigen test administered earlier in the morning as part of the standard protocol required to meet with Trump.

"We will be working with the manufacturer to have a better understanding of how the discrepancy between these two tests could have occurred," the statement added.

https://www.foxnews.com/us/ohio-gov-dewine-tests-negative-covid-19-hours-testing-positive

 

So from what you quoted above....the two negative tests were RT-PCR tests, which are the "daily numbers of positives" reported.  So nothing has changed there.

 

The positive test was a new, rapid antigen test that some wish to push and promote country wide.... my personal take is that would be a Very Bad Idea until we get some harder data on their rate of false positives and negatives - and this is Exhibit A (for antigen, get it?  I kill me!) as to why.

 

27 minutes ago, OldTimeAFLGuy said:

 

...just curious then as to why Ohio would rely on that test for their Governor FIRST, based on your assessment relative to accuracy?.....wouldn't that set off a statewide panic?......and then the PCR test (twice) reveals negatives......

 

I got nothin' for you. 

If I were the governor, I'd be having one of my aides speed-dial the FDA and say "WTF are you doing authorizing that POS test?  You better check it out."

 

If I recall correctly, it's a lateral flow immunoassay.  We have a chap here, he spoke up a few times in the Facts thread, who has consulted with manufacturers on this technology as I recall.

[OldTimeAFLGuy]

Just now, Hapless Bills Fan said:

 

So from what you quoted above....the two negative tests were RT-PCR tests, which are the "daily numbers of positives" reported.  So nothing has changed there.

 

The positive test was a new, rapid antigen test that some wish to push and promote country wide.... my personal take is that would be a Very Bad Idea until we get some harder data on their rate of false positives and negatives - and this is Exhibit A (for antigen, get it?  I kill me!) as to why.

 

 

...thank you......from your scientific community perspective, which of these two tests would you consider more reliable?.....is the first method potentially misleading with the second method producing negatives twice your preferred choice?....wouldn't such a potential discrepancy lead to distorting "positive reporting"?.....thanks for your help..........

[BillsFan4]

1 hour ago, OldTimeAFLGuy said:

 

...just curious then as to why Ohio would rely on that test for their Governor FIRST, based on your assessment relative to accuracy?.....wouldn't that set off a statewide panic?......and then the PCR test (twice) reveals negatives......

The first rapid test was used because he was visiting trump.

 

Anyone who visits Trump has to take that rapid covid test before they visit. It’s part of their protocol. I don’t know for sure why they use that test for people visiting the president but I would guess that they use the rapid antigen test because PCR tests are sent to a lab and it takes longer to get results, which would complicate things.

 

Some details on what happened:

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/08/06/us/mike-dewine-coronavirus.html

Edited August 7, 2020 by BillsFan4
Spelling error

[BillsFan4]

Hey @Hapless Bills Fan did you see this study yet?

 

https://www.thelancet.com/journals/eclinm/article/PIIS2589-5370(20)30228-5/fulltext

Cerebral Micro-Structural Changes in COVID-19 Patients –
An MRI-based 3-month Follow-up Study

 

Looks like it was a follow-up study done 3 months after the patient got covid.

Quote

In this follow-up stage, neurological symptoms were presented in 55% COVID-19 patients. 

 

Ages: 
 

Quote

56.67% male; age: 44.10 ± 16.00) and 39 age- and sex-matched non-COVID-19 controls (56.41% male; age: 45.88 ± 13.90). 

It looks like they were not elderly patients.

 

Quote

COVID-19 patients had statistically significantly higher bilateral gray matter volumes (GMV) in olfactory cortices, hippocampi, insulas, left Rolandic operculum, left Heschl's gyrus and right cingulate gyrus and a general decline of MD, AD, RD accompanied with an increase of FA in white matter, especially AD in the right CR, EC and SFF, and MD in SFF compared with non-COVID-19 volunteers (corrected p value <0.05). Global GMV, GMVs in left Rolandic operculum, right cingulate, bilateral hippocampi, left Heschl's gyrus, and Global MD of WM were found to correlate with memory loss (p value <0.05). GMVs in the right cingulate gyrus and left hippocampus were related to smell loss (p value <0.05). MD-GM score, global GMV, and GMV in right cingulate gyrus were correlated with LDH level (p value <0.05).

Interpretation

Study findings revealed possible disruption to micro-structural and functional brain integrity in the recovery stages of COVID-19, suggesting the long-term consequences of SARS-CoV-2.

bit over my head here... lol 

[Hapless Bills Fan]

1 hour ago, OldTimeAFLGuy said:

 

...thank you......from your scientific community perspective, which of these two tests would you consider more reliable?.....is the first method potentially misleading with the second method producing negatives twice your preferred choice?....wouldn't such a potential discrepancy lead to distorting "positive reporting"?.....thanks for your help..........

 

There's no question the RT-PCR test is the more reliable and sensitive.  The negatives (in people who become ill, or even are showing symptoms) has to do with the virus being below the limit of detection or the sample not being taken or handled properly.  It's highly specific - the US test is based on binding to two different specific regions that are only found on SARS-CoV2. Contrary to some stuff you hear it does not cross react to cold viruses etc.  It can't amplify covid-19 RNA if it isn't there.  BUT, said RNA can get there if the lab handling the samples does not exercise great care.  False positives are usually laboratory problems and have to do with contamination and should be avoidable.  Also, people who are recovering from infection can shed virus or viral RNA for a while, so they can test positive, then drop below limit of detection and test negative, then test positive again, then negative - frustrating.  (Happened to my friend's Dad)

 

The virtue of the antigen test is its fast and uses different chemicals.  It's not all that sensitive, is the problem, leading to picking up only on 5 or 6 of 10 people who are legit infected....that doesn't mean it's useless IF it's specific (does not produce false positives).  You use it is as a screen - you're positive on the antigen test, Done, spare the reagents and the lab equipment.  You're negative on that test, you could still have covid-19, you get a PCR test.

 

But here's the problem it doesn't have a lot of track record.  It's based on a test reagent binding to bits of viral protein and lighting up a signal.  But if the test reagent turns out to cross-react to other stuff and it gives false positives as well as implied for Ohio's governor, it's.....not diagnostically meaningful, yes, that's a good phrase.  Not diagnostically meaningful.

As far as I know, the antigen test is not yet figuring into statistics for "positives".  Those are just RT-PCR still as far as I know, but I'll be digging into that to be sure.

 

 

50 minutes ago, BillsFan4 said:

Hey @Hapless Bills Fan did you see this study yet?

 

https://www.thelancet.com/journals/eclinm/article/PIIS2589-5370(20)30228-5/fulltext

Cerebral Micro-Structural Changes in COVID-19 Patients –
An MRI-based 3-month Follow-up Study
Looks like it was a follow-up study done 3 months after the patient got covid.

Ages:
It looks like they were not elderly patients.

bit over my head here... lol 

 

Paging neurology, Neurology, you have a page on Line 1

 

1 hour ago, BillsFan4 said:

The first rapid test was used because he was visiting trump.

 

Anyone who visits Trump has to take that rapid covid test before they visit. It’s part of their protocol. I don’t know for sure why they use that test for people visiting the president but I would guess that they use the rapid antigen test because PCR tests are sent to a lab and it takes longer to get results, which would complicate things.

 

Some details on what happened:

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/08/06/us/mike-dewine-coronavirus.html

 

I'm surprised the White House team is using the Covid-19 antigen tests.  They were using the Abbot ID Now system, which has faced its own criticism for an unacceptable rate of false negatives, but it's a RT-PCR based test.

[Hapless Bills Fan]

On 8/7/2020 at 7:29 AM, K-9 said:

Bill Gates offers some interesting perspectives in this interview:

 

https://apple.news/AjtLjc6FfTaaOHGEnnN7ltQ

 

Interesting point on testing.  I hadn't thought of it in terms of reimbursement.  Maybe Gates is right:
 

But people aren’t getting their tests back quickly enough.

Well, that’s just stupidity. The majority of all US tests are completely garbage, wasted. If you don’t care how late the date is and you reimburse at the same level, of course they’re going to take every customer. Because they are making ridiculous money, and it’s mostly rich people that are getting access to that. You have to have the reimbursement system pay a little bit extra for 24 hours, pay the normal fee for 48 hours, and pay nothing [if it isn’t done by then]. And they will fix it overnight.

 

Why don’t we just do that?

Because the federal government sets that reimbursement system. When we tell them to change it they say, “As far as we can tell, we’re just doing a great job, it’s amazing!” Here we are, this is August. We are the only country in the world where we waste the most money on tests. Fix the reimbursement. Set up the CDC website. But I have been on that kick, and people are tired of listening to me.

[RocCityRoller]

50 minutes ago, Hapless Bills Fan said:

 

Interesting point on testing.  I hadn't thought of it in terms of reimbursement.  Maybe Gates is right:
 

But people aren’t getting their tests back quickly enough.

Well, that’s just stupidity. The majority of all US tests are completely garbage, wasted. If you don’t care how late the date is and you reimburse at the same level, of course they’re going to take every customer. Because they are making ridiculous money, and it’s mostly rich people that are getting access to that. You have to have the reimbursement system pay a little bit extra for 24 hours, pay the normal fee for 48 hours, and pay nothing [if it isn’t done by then]. And they will fix it overnight.

 

Why don’t we just do that?

Because the federal government sets that reimbursement system. When we tell them to change it they say, “As far as we can tell, we’re just doing a great job, it’s amazing!” Here we are, this is August. We are the only country in the world where we waste the most money on tests. Fix the reimbursement. Set up the CDC website. But I have been on that kick, and people are tired of listening to me.

 

This read was a lot more insightful, complicated and non-partisan than those couple of 'sound bites'. It was a good read. I thought I would address these two.

 

But people aren’t getting their tests back quickly enough.

Well, that’s just stupidity. 1)The majority of all US tests are completely garbage, wasted. 2) If you don’t care how late the date is and you reimburse at the same level, of course they’re going to take every customer. Because they are making ridiculous money, and it’s mostly rich people that are getting access to that. 3)You have to have the reimbursement system pay a little bit extra for 24 hours, pay the normal fee for 48 hours, and pay nothing [if it isn’t done by then]. And they will fix it overnight.

• 1) I pointed out, many many pages ago, back in March and April, that rushing test kits out for a new virus without following established FDA guidelines would be a disaster. I noted that tests approved without going through the appropriate clinical trials would lead to false positives and false negatives that would make for mass confusion and a harder time framing the impact of the virus. But no, the intersection of fear, media hysteria, political pressure and the profit principle 'fast tracked' a lot of these garbage tests. If Trump and the FDA didn't fast track tests then 'people were going to die' and it would be on their hands. Well the FDA did give into the herd hysteria and allowed fast tracking test approvals and now we have a testing mess. What a surprise. Just like Bill Gates noted above: The majority of all US tests are completely garbage. I agree 100%. Been calling the stats as a result dubious since day one and have taken a lot of flak for both positions (don't fast track the tests, don't believe the stats from fast tracked tests)
• 2) Funny Bill, a bunch of politicians keep telling us that dumping more and more government money at issues will fix all the problems. You mean that a bunch of orgs will just keep taking government money and deliver garbage? What a shocker.
• 3) Increase demand for quicker, accurate results and the supply will match? Preposterous, that would mean the market still works. /s

Why don’t we just do that?

Because the federal government sets that reimbursement system. When we tell them to change it they say, “As far as we can tell, we’re just doing a great job, it’s amazing!” Here we are, this is August. We are the only country in the world where we waste the most money on tests. Fix the reimbursement. Set up the CDC website. But I have been on that kick, and people are tired of listening to me.

• Well these are all FDA approved tests, aren't they? How exactly does the Fed Govt tell one company with a FDA approved test, that it is not a qualifying test now? What a Sh!t Show how that would be. If that is done how do we go back to all the people who were tested by one of these bad tests and 1) admit it was a garbage test, 2) your result may or may not be accurate, which means you have been possibly told misinformation about your health which could have led to a multitude of consequences, 3) all these stats about 'infectious positives' (and negatives) are dubious at best, 4) please don't sue us (Phrama and those tested).
• I hate to be that guy but this sentence makes little grammatical sense: We are the only country in the world where we waste the most money on tests. Did Bill Gates mean: We are the country in the world wasting the most money on tests? Be careful, BG, the pitchforks will come out as a hot take that 'Bill Gates thinks that testing money is wasted.' Or is BG stating that we are the only country in the world wasting money on tests? Hard to believe. A lot of panic stricken people wanted to have a test, any test, d@mn the consequences. That worked out well.

When the government just dumps copious amounts of money at a problem the results are rarely positive (though your test results might be), but some people do profit. Little people (Sammy Watkins words not mine) can too by investing in some of these companies approved in the fast track. I know I did. See my Cui Bono post about the fear and panic, and how you could profit. I didn't get rich, but did pay my July mortgage payment with those returns.

 

In places where government money may be dumped, it is wise to heed the safeguards in place and not demand they be weakened. Things like the FDA approval process for instance. Plenty of snake oil salesmen got rich selling 'Dr. Smith's Herbal Cural For What Ails You' during TB breakouts and the Spanish Flu.

 

Seems Bill Gates is not happy with these results. Surprised such a visionary didn't anticipate them.

[Hapless Bills Fan]

On 8/8/2020 at 3:23 PM, RocCityRoller said:

This read was a lot more insightful, complicated and non-partisan than those couple of 'sound bites'. It was a good read. I thought I would address these two.

 

But people aren’t getting their tests back quickly enough.

Well, that’s just stupidity. 1)The majority of all US tests are completely garbage, wasted. 2) If you don’t care how late the date is and you reimburse at the same level, of course they’re going to take every customer. Because they are making ridiculous money, and it’s mostly rich people that are getting access to that. 3)You have to have the reimbursement system pay a little bit extra for 24 hours, pay the normal fee for 48 hours, and pay nothing [if it isn’t done by then]. And they will fix it overnight.

• 1) I pointed out, many many pages ago, back in March and April, that rushing test kits out for a new virus without following established FDA guidelines would be a disaster. I noted that tests approved without going through the appropriate clinical trials would lead to false positives and false negatives that would make for mass confusion and a harder time framing the impact of the virus. But no, the intersection of fear, media hysteria, political pressure and the profit principle 'fast tracked' a lot of these garbage tests. If Trump and the FDA didn't fast track tests then 'people were going to die' and it would be on their hands. Well the FDA did give into the herd hysteria and allowed fast tracking test approvals and now we have a testing mess. What a surprise. Just like Bill Gates noted above: The majority of all US tests are completely garbage. I agree 100%. Been calling the stats as a result dubious since day one and have taken a lot of flak for both positions (don't fast track the tests, don't believe the stats from fast tracked tests)

 

RocCity,  I believe you are completely misinterpreting Bill Gates' point.
 

He is making the point here, that the tests are wasted (garbage) if they take more than 24-48 hrs for results to come back - regardless of the intrinsic specificity and selectivity, the quality of the test.  

 

If they take longer, 3 things happen:

1) They can't be used to guide clinical treatment - someone who is high risk and should be monitoring oxygen levels and possibly receive early intervention

2) They can't be used for effective contact tracing
3) Sample storage time will degrade the quality of the test (increase false negatives)

 

The majority of the tests in use by health departments and labs today are not "garbage" in the sense of being tests with poor accuracy.  They are mostly variations of the CDC test (it is NOT garbage) implemented by test manufacturers like Abbott, Roche, etc to run in high-throughput mode on automated test equipment.

 

You can tell that is Bill Gates point, because he doesn't say a word about "rushing test kits out".   There is some validity to the point that tests have been authorized without extensive validation, but you are using this article and his valid point about the TIMING of test results making the tests "worthless" or "garbage" if the turn around isn't prompt enough, to make a completely different point of your own.

If you wish to argue that this interview supports your interpretation and your point, you need to bring in sections of it that actually support what you say.  I don't believe they are there to be found.

 

On 8/8/2020 at 3:23 PM, RocCityRoller said:

(Bill Gates quote) Why don’t we just do that?

Because the federal government sets that reimbursement system. When we tell them to change it they say, “As far as we can tell, we’re just doing a great job, it’s amazing!” Here we are, this is August. We are the only country in the world where we waste the most money on tests. Fix the reimbursement. Set up the CDC website. But I have been on that kick, and people are tired of listening to me.

RocCityRoller says:

• Well these are all FDA approved tests, aren't they? How exactly does the Fed Govt tell one company with a FDA approved test, that it is not a qualifying test now?

 

The FDA granted Emergency Use Authorization to most of these tests.  The FDA can easily withdraw EUA from one or multiple companies.  In the case of antibody tests, they have done so in a number of instances.

 

But again, I believe you are misinterpreting Gates' point to ride your own horse. 

To understand Gates point, you have to know that the CARES act, passed by Congress, mandates that covid-19 tests must be covered by "Medicare, Medicaid, other government plans, and most private plans cover COVID-19 testing — and all testing-related services — entirely. That means no co-pays, no deductibles, no co-insurance charges. Free."

Gates point is that if Labcorps and Quest, the big test providers, get reimbursed at the same rate whether a sample gets run right away or sits around for 14 days, they have no incentive to acquire more equipment and hire more technicians to turn the tests around faster, or to push new strategies like pooled testing.  Because they get paid the same, they have no incentive to stop accepting tests when their capacity for 48 hr turn around is exceeded, or to add extra shifts of technicians to process the tests.  So Congress has authorized something that is financially incentivizing big tests companies to handle tests in a way that makes them useless -"wasted" or "garbage"

 

Again, his point has nothing to do with the FDA authorizing poor tests or inability to withdraw authorization.  The majority of the RT-PCR tests being used are reasonably good tests; the "waste" and "garbage" aspect has to do with rendering the results less accurate and useless for contact tracing by processing delays.

[RocCityRoller]

8 hours ago, Hapless Bills Fan said:

 

RocCity,  I believe you are completely misinterpreting Bill Gates' point.
 

He is making the point here, that the tests are wasted (garbage) if they take more than 24-48 hrs for results to come back - regardless of the intrinsic specificity and selectivity, the quality of the test.  

 

If they take longer, 3 things happen:

1) They can't be used to guide clinical treatment - someone who is high risk and should be monitoring oxygen levels and possibly receive early intervention

2) They can't be used for effective contact tracing

 

The majority of the tests in use by health departments and labs today are not "garbage" in the sense of being tests with poor accuracy.  They are mostly variations of the CDC test (it is NOT garbage) implemented by test manufacturers like Abbott, Roche, etc to run in high-throughput mode on automated test equipment.

 

You can tell that is Bill Gates point, because he doesn't say a word about "rushing test kits out".   There is some validity to the point that tests have been authorized without extensive validation, but you are using this article and his valid point about the TIMING of test results making the tests "worthless" or "garbage" if the turn around isn't prompt enough, to make a completely different point of your own.

If you wish to argue that this interview supports your interpretation and your point, you need to bring in sections of it that actually support what you say.  I don't believe they are there to be found.

 

 

The FDA granted Emergency Use Authorization to most of these tests.  The FDA can easily withdraw EUA from one or multiple companies.  In the case of antibody tests, they have done so in a number of instances.

 

But again, I believe you are misinterpreting Gates' point to ride your own horse. 

To understand Gates point, you have to know that the CARES act, passed by Congress, mandates that covid-19 tests must be covered by "Medicare, Medicaid, other government plans, and most private plans cover COVID-19 testing — and all testing-related services — entirely. That means no co-pays, no deductibles, no co-insurance charges. Free."

Gates point is that if Labcorps and Quest, the big test providers, get reimbursed at the same rate whether a sample gets run right away or sits around for 14 days, they have no incentive to acquire more equipment and hire more technicians to turn the tests around faster, or to push new strategies like pooled testing.  Because they get paid the same, they have no incentive to stop accepting tests when their capacity for 48 hr turn around is exceeded, or to add extra shifts of technicians to process the tests.  So Congress has authorized something that is financially incentivizing big tests companies to handle tests in a way that makes them useless -"wasted" or "garbage"

 

Again, his point has nothing to do with the FDA authorizing poor tests or inability to withdraw authorization.  The majority of the RT-PCR tests being used are reasonably good tests; the "waste" and "garbage" aspect has to do with rendering the results less accurate and useless for contact tracing by processing delays.

 

Hap. I appreciate you for keeping a clean scientific thread about COVID on this forum. I really do. That is not easy. Even when I posted direct reference published scientific journal articles on that thread (elsivir/ lancet etc), or brought up my own experiences working in real life clinical trials with ACM Labs they were dismissed by you as if written by a third grader. But then again they did not fit your point of view, and by extension, must be wrong. Thank God you were there to tell us all how Elsivir, ACM and Lancet were all wrong.

 

I posted here to avoid that thread on purpose.

 

A lot of us interested in a COVID discussion have avoided that thread on purpose. I have noticed that you seem to speak to everyone on this or the other thread who disagrees with you, or offers scientific studies that don't agree with you like a 2 year old. You should start your posts with 'Bless your heart'. It is quite charming after all. I suppose 'oh do you now?' or 'you don't understand' is the equivalent. I love being spoken to like that. So do other people, it's not off-putting at all. I was the data manager for an ACM Labs study that created a treatment to one of the most rare diseases on earth. Obviously I am a moron and don't understand clinical trials, or FDA requirements at all.

 

Fair enough, I am small potatoes in the field. But people and organizations like Harvey Risch, MD, PhD (Yale Epidemiology), Michigan Health and IHU-Méditerranée Infection in Marseille who are light years ahead of me have all become idiots in your threads too. I feel like I am in good company. After all the US media considers the last three to be hacks these days. I am honestly surprised you are not the surgeon general or medical correspondent to MSNBC. Then again a '4yr journalism major' can call a 30 yr Yale epidemiologist a hack these days, and it takes hold.'

 

Silly me, I took Bill Gates at his word. It is quite strong language for the founder of Microsoft and by extension Outlook, Word, Excel, Access etc to say: The majority of all US tests are completely garbage, wasted. I was obviously too dumb to read the whole article and understand what he said in contect of the rest of the article. I am happy you were there to clarify his meaning for me.

 

Hap. I will no longer offer my opinion, experience or scientific findings to your two threads on COVID. You win. Congratulations. Shut down those who have other evidence, experience, and input. Heck even Dr. Risch has been shut down from some social media platforms. He is a true blue professional in the field, You and I are guys on a message board, but now we are treated equally. Is that scientifically sound?

 

There is so much money to made off of fear, censorship and intellectual falsehoods. Dr. Risch spoke out and was silenced. Just like you try to silence people here who offer scientific data.

 

There is so much power to be gained from fear.

 

Who was I to think I could contribute to your conversation?

 

Edited August 9, 2020 by RocCityRoller