Benefits of Covid-19

[JSH]

Originally Posted by freebeard

Not that I should have to defend myself, but you edited out:

Consider that a hard break.

I don't get out much. About the only thing I will see that will be a return to normal is when they take up the one-way lanes taped down in the grocery store.

I follow the Lane County page and that's about it. We almost made 2 weeks without a new case, but their were two new ones so the clock is reset.

A hard break between what?

The whole snip: "We are reminded Oregon has a Democrat governor:"

That was followed by an article by redstate.com giving false information about what is happening in a "blue state".

The best way to know what Governor Kate Brown did is to read the actual statement. It is here:

https://www.oregon.gov/gov/Documents...s/eo_20-24.pdf

[freebeard]

Thanks. If I hadn't gone back to see what you were quoting I'd have missed Xist's TPgate comment at Permalink #159.
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[contemplative pause]
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The referral to redstate.com was the [first] result of a search for something I'd remembered reading. If there was mistaken or out-dated information there, it's good that you point it out.

[redpoint5]

Originally Posted by oil pan 4

The tests used even 6 weeks ago sucked.
My wife said they would have people who were sick test negative, they would get worse, be sent to Lubbock and then they would test positive.

Just to clarify for others, the antigen (disease) test is different than the antibody (immunity) test. A person with the antigen doesn't necessarily have antibodies yet, so an antibody test would be negative in that case. Similarly, a person who has recovered from the disease would test negative for it.

Then there's all the uncertainty of the validity of both tests. It's a data point though. Some accuracy is usually better than none at all.

[Xist]

Georgia is still around. That is good:

[freebeard]

According to Dr. John the spike (if it happens) will take a week.

He also talks about an antibody test from Roche Diagnostics that all but eliminates false positives and produces no false negatives. I think the antibody test (who's had it) is more important than the antigen test (who has it right now).
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"[Y]ou're one of my stranger internet favorites"

[redpoint5]

^Agreed^

Assuming antibodies are a fairly reliable indication of immunity, that information is valid for a longer period of time. A negative antigen test merely informs that at this moment someone doesn't have Covid. It can't say if they are susceptible later or not.

[oil pan 4]

Originally Posted by redpoint5

Just to clarify for others, the antigen (disease) test is different than the antibody (immunity) test. A person with the antigen doesn't necessarily have antibodies yet, so an antibody test would be negative in that case. Similarly, a person who has recovered from the disease would test negative for it.

Then there's all the uncertainty of the validity of both tests. It's a data point though. Some accuracy is usually better than none at all.

We have had 0 antibody testing round these parts and we still have 0 antibody testing. So we're consistent there.

[Piotrsko]

Actually at this time the testing is so fubared up the results are all over the place. Then there is the question whether or not the antibody actually last.

[JSH]

Originally Posted by Piotrsko

Actually at this time the testing is so fubared up the results are all over the place. Then there is the question whether or not the antibody actually last.

Dr. Scott Harris on Sunday talking about why they feel confident reopen Alabama. (He's the state health officer for the Alabama Department of Public Health)


CHUCK TODD:
Dr. Harris, since Alabama's doing a little more opening right now than Michigan. Although you're -- compared to some of your southern neighbors, I would argue you guys are being a bit more cautious than others. But tell me the metrics you used that gave you the confidence to advise the governor at beginning some phased-in reopenings?

DR. SCOTT HARRIS:
Sure. So we have followed a number of metrics like, I think most states have, including the White House plan for reopening. The gating criteria that I'm sure you talked about many times on this show were certainly part of the things that we considered. We have not fully satisfied all of those gating criteria in terms of cases per day. But we felt very good about our syndromic surveillance numbers. We felt very good about our hospital capacity. And so what our governor chose to do was to make a very measured step, a very gradual reopening of certain types of businesses. We did not proceed to a full phase-one reopening like was in the White House plan. Things like entertainment venues and gyms and in-person dining. We have not chosen to do that so far. But we think this is just a gradual first step.

CHUCK TODD:

What data are you missing, Dr. Harris, that you wish you had but you just -- whether it's capacity or other reasons you don't have?

DR. SCOTT HARRIS:

I think, clearly, we would like to make sure we're testing to the level that we would like. We probably have a total amount of laboratory bench capacity to do the number of tests that we would like to do. But those tests are really unevenly distributed throughout the state. If you're in a bigger, more urbanized part of our state like Jefferson County where Birmingham is located or Madison County where Huntsville is located you can probably have really good access to testing whenever you like. Butin some of our more rural parts of the state, we are able to get testing done, but there are definitely barriers there for people to obtain that, particularly if they have to find transportation or they don't have ready access to a health care provider. And we've also been surprised to find that we have not necessarily gotten negative test results reported to us. It's hard to come up with a good denominator so that we know the percent positive of tests we have. And so we have reached out to all the labs who report to us. But many of them are out of state. And it's just difficult to get all that information.


Summary:

• We didn't hit our self-determined criteria to reopen but we are doing it anyway
• We feel confident in surveillance numbers but people in rural areas are still having a hard time getting tested
• We don't know how many people we have tested or if the positive percentage is going up of down.

[redpoint5]

... and really the main criteria is if medical resources are overburdened or not. Increasing cases isn't an indication of a failed plan to increase social mobility as long as medical resources are adequate.

People like to talk in pointless terms, such as which direction new cases are moving, or number of deaths. Important metrics are things like utilization of health resources, and life expectancy. If life expectancy drops significantly due to this disease, we'll know it was a significant problem. If life expectancy doesn't drop much, it may indicate we overestimated the problem (which is required initially when something is novel). We won't know what happened to life expectancy until this pandemic is history, but we will have it as a metric to evaluate our response in hindsight.