Gates Foundation program will issue home testing kits for Covid 19 in Seattle • Hacker News Board

Re: Gates Foundation program will issue home testing kits for Covid 19 in Seattle

#221

Post by nojvek » Mon, Mar 09, 2020, 3:45 PM UTC

aplummer wrote: post #24

excerionsforte wrote: post #6

Low cost home testing kits can go beyond SARS-COV2 and track other diseases all from the safety of your home. Why go to the hospital where you could possibly be infected by other people with infectious diseases or infect the people around you. Personally, if it is low cost enough that I don't need to use health insurance then I am all for it. Health insurance is good enough until surprise they don't want to cover you…

> Health insurance is good enough until surprise they don't want to cover you or you get surprise bills in the mail from the hospital. Constantly amazed this can be a thing in a first world country. Can this actually happen?

Almost everyone I know has a nightmare healthcare story. We have the worst healthcare of a first world country. Many folks who have employer provided healthcare from top tier tech companies are kinda happy but anyone who is below the 50th percentile is living on the edge and playing a gamble.

I’m a solopreneur and we’ve decided to go without health insurance. The ridiculous premiums + super high deductibles mean even if you were to go to the doctor, you’re still paying full cost.

The gamble is you want to avoid any catastrophic visits which would cost 20k+ to offset the insurance deductible + premiums.

Compared to Australia, US healthcare system would be considered a joke.

Re: Gates Foundation program will issue home testing kits for Covid 19 in Seattle

#222

Post by DuskStar » Mon, Mar 09, 2020, 3:49 PM UTC

nerdponx wrote: post #219

DuskStar wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"A US government agency massively dropped the ball" should always be a possibility to consider. Hanlon's razor: "Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity."

Both things are likely true here. Also recall that incompetence in the CDC likely stems from politically-motivated firings and funding cuts in 2018.

The 2018 funding cuts to the CDC weren't really "cuts" as much as they were the expiry of a 5-year emergency grant to fight Ebola. If it was meant to continue forever, perhaps it shouldn't have been passed as emergency funding...

I don't think you're wrong about the firings though.

Re: Gates Foundation program will issue home testing kits for Covid 19 in Seattle

#223

Post by charwalker » Mon, Mar 09, 2020, 4:59 PM UTC

aplummer wrote: post #24

excerionsforte wrote: post #6

Low cost home testing kits can go beyond SARS-COV2 and track other diseases all from the safety of your home. Why go to the hospital where you could possibly be infected by other people with infectious diseases or infect the people around you. Personally, if it is low cost enough that I don't need to use health insurance then I am all for it. Health insurance is good enough until surprise they don't want to cover you…

> Health insurance is good enough until surprise they don't want to cover you or you get surprise bills in the mail from the hospital. Constantly amazed this can be a thing in a first world country. Can this actually happen?

We're already out of pocket about US$1000 this year with basic check ups, lab tests, and one allergy test (more to come) for my SO. That's with one of the best employer provided healthcare benefits I've ever had that has about $400 a month in premiums.

If I need a sleep study or further surgery as already recommended then we are looking at $4-5k for that alone not including followup, medications, supplies, or other appointments.

Without the ACA I might be dead today due to costs and availability like if I was denied insurance based on pre-existing conditions and could not afford medical care I needed over the last 5-8 years plus mental health care. My parents paid about $22k out of pocket for a surgery I needed during that time (and on their insurance).

I'd have about $45-50k in the bank if my healthcare over the past decade was 100% covered. That is about 10x my current retirement savings or could be a down payment on a house. The USA is not representative of first world countries or at least should not be directly compared to them when it comes to health care.

Re: Gates Foundation program will issue home testing kits for Covid 19 in Seattle

#224

Post by CobrastanJorji » Mon, Mar 09, 2020, 7:51 PM UTC

kalium_xyz wrote: post #172

CobrastanJorji wrote: post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A 40% false positive may be acceptable for purposes of quarantining, so long as the false negative rate is low and the percentage of healthy people being tested is relatively low. It'd be a bit like a bloom filter of quarantine. Can this person skip quarantine? Test says okay. Can this other person leave? Test says no, but that's not solid evidence that they have the disease.

It also has a large false negative, see the posts i replied to

Oh, well in that case, yeah, I agree, that's not very useful.

Re: Gates Foundation program will issue home testing kits for Covid 19 in Seattle

#225

Post by joe_the_user » Mon, Mar 09, 2020, 8:05 PM UTC

lern_too_spel wrote: post #215

joe_the_user wrote: post #211

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The difference is countries widely affected by the virus; Italy and Iran. They too have exponential grow of cases and would logically lots of new cases. Sure, countries that don't enough cases shouldn't be compared but countries with an equivalent growth pattern make sense to compare. At the same time, we can look at the total outside China fetal rate and that's about 2%, which again Korea is doing notably better tha…

> All of this is in context of most infection being new, all of it. No. The average time to die after infection is 28 days. Korea has been testing aggressively, and 28 days ago had fewer than 50 cases, despite finding cases earlier in their development. These other countries found cases who were already infected longer. That's why they have more deaths but also why they have more recoveries. You cannot gauge effectiv…

> These other countries found cases who were already infected longer. That's why they have more deaths but also why they have more recoveries.

Yeah, and as I already noted, this situation MEANS that these other countries are failing to control the infection because they are finding infections late, which is going to mean more deaths later.

> You cannot gauge effectiveness of treatment until you've given the treated time to recover or die.

Sure, I shouldn't imply Korea does just better treatment rather than that the treatment/test combination regime of Korea seems like the superior model relative to other countries and I think have mostly said that. We can see notably that the infection rate in Korea has dropped off markedly in the last few days.

Re: Gates Foundation program will issue home testing kits for Covid 19 in Seattle

#226

Post by progman32 » Mon, Mar 09, 2020, 8:37 PM UTC

pneill wrote: post #74

What’s the point of testing? There is no treatment. So knowing you have it or not is pointless. If you have it, and it’s serious, you’ll seek medical attention regardless of whether you know it or not. When you see the ridiculous on hand sanitizer and toilet paper, even if there was an over the counter version, you wouldn’t be able to find one in the store.

Having a positive test is an ironclad excuse not to go into work, for one thing.

Re: Gates Foundation program will issue home testing kits for Covid 19 in Seattle

#227

Post by lern_too_spel » Mon, Mar 09, 2020, 8:46 PM UTC

joe_the_user wrote: post #225

lern_too_spel wrote: post #215

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> All of this is in context of most infection being new, all of it. No. The average time to die after infection is 28 days. Korea has been testing aggressively, and 28 days ago had fewer than 50 cases, despite finding cases earlier in their development. These other countries found cases who were already infected longer. That's why they have more deaths but also why they have more recoveries. You cannot gauge effectiv…

> These other countries found cases who were already infected longer. That's why they have more deaths but also why they have more recoveries. Yeah, and as I already noted, this situation MEANS that these other countries are failing to control the infection because they are finding infections late, which is going to mean more deaths later. > You cannot gauge effectiveness of treatment until you've given the treated t…

> this situation MEANS that these other countries are failing to control the infection

I never disputed that.

> Sure, I shouldn't imply Korea does just better treatment

You didn't imply that. You stated explicitly that Korea does better treatment when that statement is based on a gross misunderstanding of CFR data and said you were going to spread that misinformation. ("I darn well intent [sic] to keep pointing to this.") That's the only thing that I took issue with.

> We can see notably that the infection rate in Korea has dropped off markedly in the last few days.

That has nothing to do with fatality rate.

Re: Gates Foundation program will issue home testing kits for Covid 19 in Seattle

#228

Post by joe_the_user » Mon, Mar 09, 2020, 10:07 PM UTC

lern_too_spel wrote: post #227

joe_the_user wrote: post #225

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> These other countries found cases who were already infected longer. That's why they have more deaths but also why they have more recoveries. Yeah, and as I already noted, this situation MEANS that these other countries are failing to control the infection because they are finding infections late, which is going to mean more deaths later. > You cannot gauge effectiveness of treatment until you've given the treated t…

> this situation MEANS that these other countries are failing to control the infection I never disputed that. > Sure, I shouldn't imply Korea does just better treatment You didn't imply that. You stated explicitly that Korea does better treatment when that statement is based on a gross misunderstanding of CFR data and said you were going to spread that misinformation. ("I darn well intent [sic] to keep pointing to th…

Fine, what I should have said for absolute clarity is:

"China and Korea have effectively dealt with the virus, infections in both those areas have been declining. And Korea now is effectively the lowest fatality rate for any of the effected countries which points to excellent surveillance and adequate treatment."

Instead of: "China and Korea have effectively treated the virus, infections in both those areas have been declining. And Korea now is effectively the lowest fatality rate for any of the effected countries which points to excellent surveillance and treatment."

But this isn't big change. Moreover, I think Korean model - ie, lots of testing - looks good in total and I think I've made clear that's what I advocate.

I would note in China's case, with infections declining everywhere, the fatality rate outside Hubei is fairly low also.

Re: Gates Foundation program will issue home testing kits for Covid 19 in Seattle

#229

Post by mercer » Mon, Mar 09, 2020, 10:36 PM UTC

dboreham wrote: post #190

claudeganon wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s a long standing problem with these kind of rapid diagnostics for respiratory illnesses: https://www.cbsnews.com/news/rapid-flu-tests-only-50-to-70-p... Doing two swabs helps mitigate this, as does comparing anal and oral swabs. Here’s a more thorough breakdown: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/22221751.2020.1...

Pretty sure even I could tell the difference between an anal swab and a nasal swab.

Maybe people are confused because both their noses and butts smell?

Re: Gates Foundation program will issue home testing kits for Covid 19 in Seattle

#230

Post by craftinator » Tue, Mar 10, 2020, 4:33 AM UTC

Ididntdothis wrote: post #69

craftinator wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe before a surgery, gather all of the hospital staff who are going to attend, and record a video while saying "I do not consent to working with anyone from out of network. If you are an out of network physician, I do not consent to be your patient." That ought to be interesting in court if they bill you. Really, the onus of responsibility is between your insurance company and the hospital (i.e. paying and billing…

You clearly haven't dealt with these guys. The hospital can charge whatever it feels like and the insurance pays whatever it feels like. And the patient sits in the middle and has to figure it out.

I have dealt with them, once, and I got the pokey end of the stick. I honestly don't know what would work, but I think operating on someone who has specified that they don't consent is kinda the definition of criminal; I think Mayhem would be the official charge.