Testing alternatives

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Pelayo
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11:25a, 3/18/20
AG
This company stopped by and is advertising 24 hour turn around.

Anyone know if they are legitimate or reputable?

www.genetworx.com

We've asked for their CLIA license and medical director's name.

If they check out might try it for borderline hospital cases and patients willing to risk out of network fees. Labcorp and Quest are taking about 6 days currently.

No material on this site is intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. See full Medical Disclaimer.
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Snow Monkey Ambassador
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12:23p, 3/18/20
AG
I have a question about this: why is getting tested so important?

I mean, let's say you have symptoms, but they're generally mild. Why do you need (or even want) to be tested? Just act as if you have it and go on about your life, trying to minimize contact (which you should be doing anyway). If you are bad enough that you are hospitalized, maybe they test you in order to provide treatment (if there is any). But, beyond that, why is everyone so worked up about testing? I don't get it.
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Greenlander
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In reply to Snow Monkey Ambassador • 12:48p, 3/18/20
AG
Snow Monkey Ambassador said:
I have a question about this: why is getting tested so important?

I mean, let's say you have symptoms, but they're generally mild. Why do you need (or even want) to be tested? Just act as if you have it and go on about your life, trying to minimize contact (which you should be doing anyway). If you are bad enough that you are hospitalized, maybe they test you in order to provide treatment (if there is any). But, beyond that, why is everyone so worked up about testing? I don't get it.


There are many examples where being able to get a test would be helpful. For example, let's say you annually have seasonal allergies. You currently have a runny nose and a cough. You deliver paper products to hospitals which means you are tangentially an essential worker. Or your wife is a nurse. How long should you quarantine? Or should you isolate? How long should your wife quarantine when she is needed at the hospital? A test could resolve this, but your symptoms are not eligible at this time.
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HotardAg07
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In reply to Snow Monkey Ambassador • 12:51p, 3/18/20
AG
Snow Monkey Ambassador said:
I have a question about this: why is getting tested so important?

I mean, let's say you have symptoms, but they're generally mild. Why do you need (or even want) to be tested? Just act as if you have it and go on about your life, trying to minimize contact (which you should be doing anyway). If you are bad enough that you are hospitalized, maybe they test you in order to provide treatment (if there is any). But, beyond that, why is everyone so worked up about testing? I don't get it.
Aggressive testing, including testing people who have had contact with confirmed cases who are not symptomatic, has been shown to be the most effective way of flattening the curve. Some local examples in Italy and South Korea have shown it's effectiveness. If you can flag people who are not symptomatic yet and get them to isolate early, it helps everyone.

Example:
https://www.ft.com/content/0dba7ea8-6713-11ea-800d-da70cff6e4d3
Shaun Shaikh '07
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Todd 02
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12:53p, 3/18/20
AG
This whole thing has been driven by fear of the unknown. If I get tested, at least I know. Doesn't matter if there's nothing I can do with the information.
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Thomas Ford 91
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12:59p, 3/18/20
AG
Honestly, we've past the point where testing is a useful containment tool. Now, the best reason for general testing is to find out how many people have gained immunity. When we hit the herd immunity percentage, we can all head back out.

Just guessing, but I would think effective herd immunity is much lower for a virus where the large majority of cases are asymptomatic. Normally, it is 75-80% for the things you vaccinate for For this, it might be 30-40%.
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Snow Monkey Ambassador
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In reply to HotardAg07 • 1:23p, 3/18/20
AG
HotardAg07 said:
Snow Monkey Ambassador said:
I have a question about this: why is getting tested so important?

I mean, let's say you have symptoms, but they're generally mild. Why do you need (or even want) to be tested? Just act as if you have it and go on about your life, trying to minimize contact (which you should be doing anyway). If you are bad enough that you are hospitalized, maybe they test you in order to provide treatment (if there is any). But, beyond that, why is everyone so worked up about testing? I don't get it.
Aggressive testing, including testing people who have had contact with confirmed cases who are not symptomatic, has been shown to be the most effective way of flattening the curve. Some local examples in Italy and South Korea have shown it's effectiveness. If you can flag people who are not symptomatic yet and get them to isolate early, it helps everyone.

Example:
https://www.ft.com/content/0dba7ea8-6713-11ea-800d-da70cff6e4d3
If everyone is self-quarantining or social distancing, testing does nothing to flatten the curve.
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HotardAg07
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In reply to Snow Monkey Ambassador • 1:28p, 3/18/20
AG
Everybody isn't self quarantining. If you accept the reports that 50-80% of people walking around with coronavirus are asymptomatic, that means that waiting until someone shows symptoms to isolate is already too late.The results of the areas who have gone to strong testing regimens have shown very strong results in quickly reducing the new cases. South Korea is already beginning some return to normalcy, their professional basketball league just opened up.

Plus, many argue that if we had an abundance of aggressive testing, then we wouldn't need widespread isolation as much.
Shaun Shaikh '07
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Rachel 98
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1:37p, 3/18/20
AG
I can think of many examples of how testing could help in specific situations. For instance, I work at a municipal animal shelter. We have 500+ animals at our facility and 150+ employees. Most of those are "essential" employees. Based on the industry-accepted standards of care we are significantly understaffed to provide basic care to the number of animals that we have even when everyone shows up to work. Of course there are numerous employees that have various respiratory symptoms at any given time. Because of the close quarters that we work in, if a positive person came to work the virus could quickly spread throughout the staff. Since we are right on the edge of not having enough staff to care for the animals, having any significant number of staff members out sick could have disastrous consequences for the 500+ animals that depend on us. If the many staff members that have mild URI symptoms could take a test we could hopefully prevent a scenario where a bunch of staff was out all at once by having the positive person/people stay home.
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RM1993
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1:50p, 3/18/20
AG
I'm going to sound like an ass and I fully appreciate that.

No one working at an animal shelter is "essential". No, they can't work from home and if they did then animals would be neglected and eventually die. I would think a skeleton crew with some other practices and n place would be able to keep it running and humane, but in the end, human lives ves are more valuable than animal lives.

No, at this point you shouldn't abandon the animals, but you should find a way to minimize how many employees come in and how many need to be close to each other.

If one of your employees dies, and maybe 2 or 3 extended family from other employees, was keeping all those shelter animals happy and healthy worth the price?
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HotardAg07
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2:30p, 3/18/20
AG
Shaun Shaikh '07
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Snow Monkey Ambassador
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In reply to HotardAg07 • 2:38p, 3/18/20
AG
HotardAg07 said:
You're really good at following logical arguments, I see. Congrats.
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HotardAg07
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2:41p, 3/18/20
AG
https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/why-we-still-need-to-test-widely-for-coronavirus/?ex_cid=story-twitter

That story does a better job explaining it than I can.
Shaun Shaikh '07
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Rachel 98
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In reply to RM1993 • 2:43p, 3/18/20
AG
I understand where you're coming from, but I am talking about how the City of Austin defines "essential," not how you or another citizen might define it. We are under the Department of Health and Human Services and they are the ones who have chosen to define our jobs as "essential." Meaning if we elect not to show up we will no longer have our jobs. The largest work group at the shelter are the Animal Care staff, who feed/water the animals and clean the cages. Most of these are entry level jobs held by people who live paycheck to paycheck and aren't going to be willing to buck the system and lose their jobs.

There is no argument from me with regards to viewing human life as >>> animal life, but the decision-makers here are elected officials in the People's Republic of Austin and not rational human beings.
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RM1993
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In reply to Rachel 98 • 2:52p, 3/18/20
AG
Rachel 98 said:
I understand where you're coming from, but I am talking about how the City of Austin defines "essential," not how you or another citizen might define it. We are under the Department of Health and Human Services and they are the ones who have chosen to define our jobs as "essential." Meaning if we elect not to show up we will no longer have our jobs. The largest work group at the shelter are the Animal Care staff, who feed/water the animals and clean the cages. Most of these are entry level jobs held by people who live paycheck to paycheck and aren't going to be willing to buck the system and lose their jobs.

There is no argument from me with regards to viewing human life as >>> animal life, but the decision-makers here are elected officials in the People's Republic of Austin and not rational human beings.
I totally get that, I have many friends who are hourly employees and have been deemed "non-essential". Whether it is people in the food service industry or even those who work in something like the dental industry, if they aren't working then they aren't getting paid. To a person, they would all much rather risk it and get a paycheck than to try and figure out how ends are going to meet over the next few weeks with no income....
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Choobadooba
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In reply to Snow Monkey Ambassador • 2:52p, 3/18/20
There is a town in Italy where they tested every resident(between 3000-4000 people) and since Friday of last week, they haven't had a single new case.

I forget the name of it, but our brain blocks out these fears and makes us think that these sorts of things cant happen to ourselves, and thus people just go on their way like nothing is happening.
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Snow Monkey Ambassador
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In reply to Choobadooba • 2:57p, 3/18/20
AG
blakegrimez said:
There is a town in Italy where they tested every resident(between 3000-4000 people) and since Friday of last week, they haven't had a single new case.

I forget the name of it, but our brain blocks out these fears and makes us think that these sorts of things cant happen to ourselves, and thus people just go on their way like nothing is happening.
Once again, y'all don't seem to be picking up what I'm putting down.

If everyone does what he or she should be doing - staying home, limiting contact with others, etc. - then testing is meaningless in terms of flattening the curve. If you have any symptoms and immediately take precautions as if you'd tested positive, testing is meaningless in terms of flattening the curve. Bottom line: is you act as if you have or will get the virus, and follow the advice of the experts on this, testing is meaningless. This isn't a difficult concept to grasp.
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HotardAg07
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3:05p, 3/18/20
AG
SMA, and that's not what is happening currently, right? Many offices are still having people go into work in addition to the healthcare, groceries, pharmacies, etc. Clearly people are still going out and doing their thing. Daycares are still open. We aren't in a countrywide lockdown.

The 538 article argues for it better than I could. I also don't think we can lockdown forever. Testing makes it easier to return to normal.
Shaun Shaikh '07
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3:05p, 3/18/20
Choobadooba
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In reply to Snow Monkey Ambassador • 3:17p, 3/18/20
Of course, but a lot of people won't unless they see it as a threat to themselves or others around them.

Testing actualizes that fear and gets people to act.

I'd like to see a study like this done with a placebo test to see if people respond in the same way.
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Snow Monkey Ambassador
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3:23p, 3/18/20
AG
All of this is likely skewed by my own experience. I'm in Dallas, where everything is shut down and one of the largest cities in the country now looks like a ghost town. I understand that sweeping testing where this isn't the case could identify people who are carriers and cause them to stay home . . . my point is only that they should be staying home regardless. Especially if they think they're sick enough to get a test.

The lesson in all of this, in my view, is that when something like this happens we need to listen to experts. One week ago today I was skeptical. Today I have my entire family on complete lockdown, and I'm basically the only one going outside the house. If we had millions of tests laying around (the the people to process them), great. Since we don't, everyone should just be acting like they are infected now in order to help stem the tide.

My message boils down to "forget about the test; change your behavior as if everyone is infected."
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In reply to Snow Monkey Ambassador • 3:33p, 3/18/20
BlackGoldAg2011
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4:57p, 3/19/20
AG
Maybe I missed it but just another thought for a reason why testing with mild symptoms could be helpful: if you can confirm that you did in fact have it, once the self isolation period is over, you can go back out in public without worry of catching and spreading it.
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