Continuing coronavirus happenings (Part 4)

[LutherBlisset]

In the current situation, with incidence going through the roof, a negative test does not say anything, and a repeated testing after some time just checks if a probable infection has become infectious.

@DurhamO

Three negatives would be reassuring, but the clinical picture always has to be considered.

That said, in this situation, with incidence going through the roof, a positive antigene test should be considered positive. Advice: ISOLATE yourself immediately. Do not wait for a PCR test. In fact, if you can avoid it, don’t get one. Leave the PCR testing capacity for the clinicians, the frontline nurses, and everyone who has to take the risk of infecting other people while being asymptomatic.

OTH, if you get symptoms, without testing positive with a rapid assessment test, assume that you have COVID-19 until you have a PCR result stating that you are not infected.
That, too, means that you should isolate yourself to the best or your ability. Stay away from others, wear a FFP2/KN95 mask correctly, wash your hands frequently according to the guidelines, and control yourself by repeatedly testing with rapid assessment tests like I described above.

If we can’t really beat the virus, we can at least and literally buy the people in the healthcare sector some leeway.

I, for one, am going to test myself in about 8 hours from now. And I went for a nasopharyngeal RAT in a testing facility this morning - if you are vaccinated, you’ve got one for free, paid by the city, per week.

[mr_raccoon]

Kotaku

[DukeTrout]

@LutherBlisset

a negative test does not say anything

I would disagree with that, but only conditionally.

I agree 100% that a positive antigen test means one should absolutely assume true positive and isolate.

I agree also 100% that anyone symptomatic should isolate until confirmation of negative status.

What constitutes that confirmation is tough. If you have access to RAT and someone with the training to get a good sample, three negative tests in 48 hours is still conclusive. If not, then one should consider a PCR test.

For asymptomatic people with exposure, it’s even tougher. For the vaccinated, the 3 tests x 48 hours should still apply. For the unvaccinated, I’m not sure anything but a negative PCR test would justify leaving isolation, since by the time enough sequential RATs can be completed, one would already be on the side of the potential infection where upper airway samples are no longer useful.

[DurhamO]

@LutherBlisset

That said, in this situation, with incidence going through the roof, a positive antigene test should be considered positive. Advice: ISOLATE yourself immediately. Do not wait for a PCR test.

Seconded.

[Simon_Clift]

@DukeTrout

Okoye et al at University of Utah performed a similar study but had college students collect their own samples. The result was 53% sensitivity.

Right… so Omicron, high school students… doesn’t give me a warm, fuzzy feeling.

[LutherBlisset]

@Simon_Clift

I’ll bet that the probability of an infection individual showing up remains a dominant factor.

True, and still more complicated, I guess.

Thinking while typing.

I could perhaps use the odds ratio for an unvaccinated catching an infection in a household situation from a vaccinated index case as very rough approximation for the kids in a kindergarten group. (Because kids possibly shed less infectious material, but are quite probably as susceptible to infection as everyone else. And the kindergarten basically is a household situation. ETA: staff is masked, but there’s no way that is going to help with the kids. Also, they have to take off the masks oftentimes, and I don’t blame them. Try consoling a 4 yr old in hot tears with your medical grade mask on…)
As far as I remember, that odds ratio would have been been around 0.05 for Alpha. The Danish data and the British data should have something to say about Omicron, but let’s just assume that doubles. So, 0.1 (or 10 %) probability for each kid to get infected when an index case occurs.
Current regulations say: the whole contact group needs to quarantine if two cases occur in a group. These could be brought in independently (while the idea of course, is that a second case means we have a cluster at our hands, but anyway…)

Now I would need to compare the probabilities for a group of 40 and a group of 80. Roughly approximating 10 % for a secondary infection per index case (per day? nah, I think the studies give the odds ratio for the whole series length of an index case infection) per child.

Current local incidence for that age group is 486 per 100k. I don’t know the total number of kids in town, but do I need those? I want to approximate the time until someone carries the infection into a group of 40, and in a group of 80… Just for now assuming this would be a static incidence, could do a dynamically developed later…

Damn I’m tired.

Ok, I can’t think properly. I would really like to get an informed feeling for this, but now it’s just six hours until my next RAT and I still need to wind down after screentime.

OTH, this is fun. (Oh, a cookie! I’ll do SCIENCE to it… )

ETA: oh, you edited your post and expanded.

Damn, toast? Now I’m hungry.
Ok, i’ll stop now.
But just one more thing. The British and Danish data.

https://www.imperial.ac.uk/mrc-global-infectious-disease-analysis/covid-19/report-50-severity-omicron/

SARS-CoV-2 Omicron VOC Transmission in Danish Households

Hey, let’s do the Danish prince thing.
To be infectious. Or not to be infectious. That is the question.

You haven’t read Shakespeare until you’ve read the German original. But I can’t decide which one. There are so many possibilities.

[Simon_Clift]

Sleep, perchance to dream.

I hate this damn disease, it’s keeping me up at nights as well…

[RickMycroft]

Ron Filipkowski

[catsidhe]

Do you think if word got around that this was a thing, but luckily vaccination will prevent it, that that might encourage them to vaccinate?

[BakaNeko]

A commuter expels a woman without a mask from the subway train in São Paulo. The government of São Paulo requires the use of masks in certain public spaces until at least March 31.

The woman was wearing white trousers and white shoes, probably she was a nurse or doctor who was once hailed as hero, but now is just just tired of two years fighting the virus and now enduring abuse of obnoxious patients.

Passageira expulsa mulher sem máscara de vagão do Metrô de São Paulo; veja vídeo

[bluehenbear]

Covid is not a workplace hazard, according to “experts”

Supreme Court Blocks Workplace Vaccine Mandate, Says Covid Not an...

[Otherbrother]

@LutherBlisset

Advice: ISOLATE yourself immediately. Do not wait for a PCR test. In fact, if you can avoid it, don’t get one. Leave the PCR testing capacity for the clinicians, the frontline nurses, and everyone who has to take the risk of infecting other people while being asymptomatic.

That’s reasonable advice, and I know a couple people who have done just that following a positive antigen test, but I wonder about how it’s affecting the data that the CDC and epidemiologists are working with. Maybe it’s not worth the risk or strain on resources just to provide better data, but I have to imagine that with people skipping the PCRs and no easy way for people to self-report their home rapid tests, the available statistics on case rates is getting less accurate all the time.

[DukeTrout]

You are supposed to report it to your county health department. That’s how contact tracing gets done. If you contact any clinician and tell them you tested positive for COVID with a RAT, they are required by law to report it to the county or state health authority.

[Otherbrother]

@DukeTrout

You are supposed to report it to your county health department.

Well I’m sure the process varies by region but it’s definitely not considered to be required here in California, and even if you do do it, it still doesn’t get counted as part of the number on the State’s covid dashboard.

You are not required to report your over-the-counter test done in a non-supervised setting, according to the California Department of Public Health. Positive unobserved antigen home tests that are self reported are counted as suspected positives and won’t appear on the state’s COVID-19 dashboard.

https://www.sacbee.com/news/coronavirus/article257043487.html

[DukeTrout]

Well, there’s your under-reporting rate. If we work backwards from the excess deaths to reported COVID deaths rate, COVID cases are under-reported at a 40-50% clip.

[Otherbrother]

@DukeTrout

If we work backwards from the excess deaths to reported COVID deaths rate, COVID cases are under-reported at a 40-50% clip.

Maybe, but while the excess deaths are certainly pandemic-related I think that not all of them are caused by the virus directly. For example, all those folks who are having surgeries delayed due to hospitals being overrun, or having diabetes going untreated due to extended lockdowns at home, avoiding non-critical routine trips to the doctor, etc. I don’t know how many excess deaths that kind of thing led to but it’s definitely not zero.

[vermes82]

Finland announces first Covid-related death of a child

[LutherBlisset]

Seriously: that doesn’t matter for the advice to isolate after a positive test.

At all.

I know you aren’t suggesting not to self-isolate, but I wanted to emphasize that it is unimportant to weigh if your data point should rather contribute to improve the statistics and using currently limited testing capacity (or even worse, if you should not trust the result and not self-isolate until you get a confirmation by PCR).

Right now, the prior information to consider is that the virus can be considered to be everywhere.

[catsidhe]

Novak Djokovic's visa cancelled, tennis player to be deported

[Jesse13927]

Way to go, Australia!

Also, having previously been deported makes it all the more difficult for him to get in again (and a lot of countries make you check a box if you have been deported from any country for any reason on your immigration form, so good luck with that Novak! Should have just gotten vaccinated!)