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A positive test is the admission ticket for monoclonal antibody therapy, which is very effective against the delta variant if it's administered early in the disease. The longer a symptomatic person waits to get a confirmed positive, the less effective the monoclonal antibodies are.
There is a third monoclonal antibody effective against omicron, but it's in very short supply.
When the Paxlovid pills (the combination of nirmatrelvir and ritonavir) become widely available, a positive test will be an admission ticket for those too.
That's a good point, but in that case we should be reserving testing capacity for those who aren't vaccinated or have other complicating conditions and have symptoms. The current testing load could be putting lives at risk by denying testing to those who need it most.
My concern isn't so much people who are sick getting tests, but rather people who neither have symptoms nor known exposures but are being asked to test anyway before returning to school or work or attending a social event. That seems like a misuse of limited resources.
That's a good point, but in that case we should be reserving testing capacity for those who aren't vaccinated or have other complicating conditions and have symptoms. The current testing load could be putting lives at risk by denying testing to those who need it most.
Yes, it does. But aside from the question of who's not vaccinated, over 40% of the adult population is at increased risk because of one condition or another -- age > 75, diabetes, obesity, COPD, chemotherapy, renal failure, immune system disorder, occupational exposure (e.g. paramedics), and on and on. Testing those people saves lives if they can be treated in time. All it takes for someone to jump the line is to claim a complicating factor that he or she actually doesn't have. The only practical answer to that is requiring an MD's order for a COVID-19 test... exactly what the epidemiologists don't want to do.
As for vaccination, I don't believe the majority of people who are vaccinated want to see any preference given to people who opted not to be vaccinated. There is already a backlash that says unvaccinated people ought to be triaged at the bottom of the list, except for the very small percentage of people who cannot be vaccinated for medical reasons (e.g. people whose immune systems are entirely non-functional). Otherwise you get the insanity of a person with a heart attack dying for the sole reason that hospitals are clogged with voluntarily unvaccinated people.
Too be completely honest, I'm thinking that at this point we need to consider simply letting the chips fall where they may. I say that of course as a boosted person, safe in the knowledge that for those who have followed the science, this is now an endemic event. This Omicron variant is spreading like wildfire, much faster and efficiently than its predecessors and it's foolish to think at this point testing is the answer. For those fully up to date on the vaccine, this is turning out to be about as impactful as a moderate head cold (which in itself is some former pandemic-level virus that's kicking around).
The long lines should be for people seeking the booster, and once received, going on with their lives.
As an aside, we're flying tomorrow and will be wearing N95 masks (first time for us, by the way, as we were using standard issue disposable masks all along). I'm not wearing it to protect me, or my also fully boosted wife, but rather those around us in case we're carrying and don't know it. So I'm not heartless, just practical.
I'm fully vaccinated but I've had something (just a head cold perhaps?) since early last week. I got the PCR test Wednesday afternoon and I'm STILL waiting for the results. Come to find out, the testing facility was closed on the 31st (who does that?) and is closed all weekend. It might be tomorrow before I finally get my results. I thought maybe getting a rapid test while I wait might at least give me some idea so I can see my mom.
Yeah it’ll be interesting to see how many parents actually sign up for that. Weekly pool testing is utterly useless for something like Omicron. It’s not like they’re doing contact tracing anymore.
Jim Martin must be in a constant state of panic at this point.
I'm thinking that there was a better.cjance of getting covid at those testing sites than anywhere else in town.
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Come to find out, the testing facility was closed on the 31st (who does that?) and is closed all weekend. It might be tomorrow before I finally get my results. I thought maybe getting a rapid test while I wait might at least give me some idea so I can see my mom.
