Too Many of the Wrong Tests and None of the Right

Townhall.com ^ | August 7, 2020 | Phil Kerpen

[Kaslin]

After an early bureaucratic disaster - the feds banned private-sector tests and failed to deliver a test that worked - the U.S. has ramped up testing to astronomical levels, dwarfing the rest of the world and any historical comparison.

We average about 1.5 million tests per flu season, and we've now run over 57 million tests for COVID-19. But have all those tests delivered what proponents of mass testing promised? Have they contained the spread and restored public confidence that infectious people are at home, not out and about.

Absolutely not. In fact, by the time most test results are available, the people who were positive are no longer infectious. The tests serve no actual infection control purpose. And the tests that actually would make all the difference are still banned by the FDA.

The CDC reports that most infected people are no longer infectious six to ten days after symptom onset. People with very severe disease can be infectious longer - up to 20 days - but people with severe disease aren't waiting for a test result to find out if they are sick and to self-isolate. The CDC also reports, however, that even though they have never found live, infectious viruses three weeks after symptom onset, the so-called gold standard PCR tests we have been using can show up positive based on non-infectious viral debris for up to 12 weeks.

So the mass, industrial-scale testing we're doing, requiring several days turnaround time, isn't letting infectious people know they are positive quickly enough to alter their behavior. And many of the positives are likely meaningless artifacts of months-old infections. It feeds a mass public panic but accomplishes little else.

The tests that we actually need are instant tests that people could take themselves and would provide results in the morning, allowing people to confidently go about their daily activities knowing they are not infectious. These tests, called paper antigen tests, have been developed by a team at MIT that applied for FDA approval back in March. There are several companies ready to mass-produce them with FDA approval. And unlike the PCR tests that cost around $100 per test, the paper antigen tests could cost as little as $2, making daily self-testing cost-effective for most Americans.

In an astonishing display of government stupidity, the FDA's objection to the paper antigen tests is based on precisely the characteristic that makes them vastly superior to the PCR tests: they are far less sensitive. The FDA has used the extreme sensitivity of the PCR tests as a benchmark and refused to issue emergency use authorizations for less sensitive tests. But a test that is so sensitive that it picks up viral debris for months is not a useful tool to prevent infection.

A less sensitive test that is calibrated to show up positive when a person is actually infectious is far more useful. That makes the paper antigen tests not only cheaper and faster, but also better than the 57 million PCR tests that have become a national obsession.

From the beginning, the FDA has made a total mess of testing. Last week they finally introduced a new application for at-home testing. They should approve applications from credible paper antigen test manufacturers as soon as possible - they really should have done it months ago.

[MAGAthon]

not reported by FakeNewsMSM:

31 Jul: Gateway Pundit: Ontario, Canada Govt Medical Official Warns Against Mass Coronavirus Testing– ‘Will Not Actually Achieve Anything’, False Positives ‘Almost Half’ in Low COVID Areas (VIDEO)
By Kristinn Taylor
As Ontario, Canada prepares to open schools for children in September, Ontario’s Associate Chief Medical Officer of Health Dr. Barbara Yaffe warned against mass testing for the COVID-19 China coronavirus, saying it takes resources from other needed areas and does not “actually achieve anything.” Dr. Yaffe also said that in areas with low incidences of COVID infection, the rate for false positive test results is “almost half.”...

“You know, I think a lot of people think that testing is going to really solve the whole problem, and it isn’t. It’s one component of a response. If you test somebody today, uh, you only know if they’re infected today. And in fact if you’re testing in a population that doesn’t have very much COVID, you’ll get false positives almost half the time. That is the person actually doesn’t have COVID, they have something else, they may have nothing. Uh, so it will just complicate the picture.”...
VIDEO by CTV News..

VIDEO: Longer version by Global News with comments on the need for children to be in school...
https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2020/07/ontario-canada-govt-medical-official-warns-mass-coronavirus-testing-will-not-actually-achieve-anything-false-positives-almost-half-low-covid-areas-video/

linking to Yaffe from Gateway Pundit might take you to the CTV article, which omits her altogether. best to link straight to the following for short version of her remarks:

Tweet: CTV News
Ontario Associate Chief Medical Officer of Health Dr. Barbara Yaffe says mandatory COVID-19 testing for teachers “will just complicate the picture.” VIDEO Read more...CTV LINK - NO MENTION OF YAFFE
31 Jul 2020
https://twitter.com/CTVNews/status/1288907122818854913?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw

[ClearCase_guy]

But a test that is so sensitive that it picks up viral debris for months is not a useful tool to prevent infection.

Useful for promoting panic, though.

[.30Carbine]

But a test that is so sensitive that it picks up viral debris for months is not a useful tool to prevent infection.

But it sure does help when you want to inflate those case numbers!

[.30Carbine]

LOL...

[teeman8r]

In before the flu bro

[mrsmith]

Great article!
The antigen tests are perfect for public health use.

Which is different from what is useful for treatment.

[MAGAthon]

caution re the antigen test:

6 Aug: NYT: Gov. Mike DeWine of Ohio Tests Positive, and Then Negative, for Coronavirus
by Sarah Mervosh
Gov. Mike DeWine tested negative for the coronavirus hours after a positive rapid-result test prevented him from welcoming President Trump to Ohio on Thursday, reflecting the increasingly complex state of testing in the United States...

When Mr. DeWine was first tested on Thursday morning as part of a White House screening, he received an antigen test, a new frontier of testing that allows for results in minutes, not days, but has been shown to be less accurate. The positive result came as a “big surprise,” said Mr. DeWine, who had not been experiencing symptoms other than a headache...
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/08/06/us/mike-dewine-coronavirus.html

[neodad]

This states the issue pretty clearly: https://youtu.be/cP-MHKU_cQE

[srmorton]

Here in NC our POS governor just extended our Phase 2 misery for five more weeks! He and our incompetent DHS Secretary are both complicit in inflating the positive case numbers in our state. The saying "its not who votes, but who counts the votes" could be modified to "its not who tests, but who reports the results of the tests".

I was talking to a hospital worker yesterday morning. She knows a doctor who tested positive for the virus and ended up having six tests done, all of which were positive. They finally let him go back to work because his services were so desperately needed. ALL SIX of his tests were counted as having been done on different people, when they actually were done on the same person. Nor only is the governor guilty of fraud, but so is his HHS Director. As a person who trained as and now teaches Medical Laboratory Technologists, this is OUTRAGAEOUS!

[NonValueAdded]

Ping

[moovova]

"...and we've now run over 57 million tests for COVID-19 and your DNA."

[LateBoomer]

At my local clinic they’re testing 400 people a day (per the nurse doing my lab work). And that’s just one location of several. At the onset of this, it was only a handful a week as the criteria were so narrow to be able to get the test.

Of course the number of cases have gone up.

[LateBoomer]

Yes. Every single positive test is counted as a new case. I totally believe they counted one person as six cases.

[moovova]

NC here...and pissed about Cooper’s extension also!

AND... I keep seeing his smarmy-looking face on TV commercials patting himself on the back. Just puke.

[Freee-dame]

This might be why Obama just stopped the (mass ?) testing during the pandemic which occurred during his presidency. PDJT needs some new advisors, at least some additional advisors, added to the task force. How far will scientists or bureaucrats go to keep from having their opinions or theories proven wrong?

[SmokingJoe]

The CDC reports that most infected people are no longer infectious six to ten days after symptom onset. People with very severe disease can be infectious longer - up to 20 days - but people with severe disease aren't waiting for a test result to find out if they are sick and to self-isolate. The CDC also reports, however, that even though they have never found live, infectious viruses three weeks after symptom onset, the so-called gold standard PCR tests we have been using can show up positive based on non-infectious viral debris for up to 12 weeks.

Time to stop mass testing NOW.
They are of absolutely no use.

[palmer]

Yep, it's all about the false positive rate. A high false positifve rate is fine if you want to be overly cautious (e.g. around the President). But it's not fine when they overtest. The positivity rates in NY are 1% or less. That means most people testing posiitive are not positive. They are banned from working and cause more people to be tested and create more false positives.

NY loves false positives, it keeps the economy shut down and increases the bailout money that they are angling for after they elect Biden.

[palmer]

Time to stop mass testing NOW.

Yep, test the nursing home employees and residents so they can be separated (worked well in Mass after the initital disaster). Test the jail employees, chicken plant workers and a few other key sentinels. Otherwise stop the tresting.

[SmokingJoe]

Trump is totally blowing his coronavirus handling, especially this masks nonsense. And he is not pushing HCQ forcefully enough.