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CDC coronavirus testing decision likely to haunt nation for months to come

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Re: CDC coronavirus testing decision likely to haunt nation for months to come

#81

Post by fabian2k »

Svip wrote: post #65
omgJustTest wrote: post #61

This article does not mention the WHO offered tests to the US before the CDC decided it should make its own[1]. This alone should have been enough to bring impeachment charges against public officials, for criminal neglect. If the WHO had proven these in China, and you have no other alternative, it make sense to do both 1. buy tests you know are in active use and 2. make your own tests if needed. Someone at the CDC m…

To clarify. The WHO did not offer the US tests. The Politico article just says that the US was not on the list of countries it offered tests. It never offers the US tests, because it has national labs that can make their own tests. The WHO only gives tests to countries who do not have a national infrastructure of their own to build tests. But the WHO did recommend the Berlin tests, as it had no false positives, and w…

Just as additional information for anyone interested, this is the paper about the development of the test distributed by the WHO:

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6988269/

This was published on January 23, and it contains all the information you need to establish this kind of test in your own lab. And while I'm not an expert in this area, the controls done to ensure avoiding false positives based on other viruses seem pretty thorough to me. And this validation is the part that I would suspect to be one of the more time-consuming and important aspects.

Re: CDC coronavirus testing decision likely to haunt nation for months to come

#82

Post by throwaway122378 »

omgJustTest wrote: post #61

This article does not mention the WHO offered tests to the US before the CDC decided it should make its own[1]. This alone should have been enough to bring impeachment charges against public officials, for criminal neglect. If the WHO had proven these in China, and you have no other alternative, it make sense to do both 1. buy tests you know are in active use and 2. make your own tests if needed. Someone at the CDC m…

What’s your point? The WHO lost all credibility.

As late as January 14, 2020 the WHO tweeted that there is NO evidence of human to human transmission of covid-19

https://twitter.com/WHO/status/1217043229427761152?s=20

Re: CDC coronavirus testing decision likely to haunt nation for months to come

#83

Post by throwaway122378 »

h2odragon wrote: post #47

Where was the media in this? Lots of scare stories about potential pandemics back to January, in the US media, but I dont recall much if any "the CDC is fucking up / not testing" coverage. Of course that kind of thing was probably being said in the froth of the fringe and conspiracy theorists, but thats all "fake news" and unmentionable now.

On 1/24/20 the WHO said there’s no human to human transmission of covid-19

https://twitter.com/WHO/status/1217043229427761152?s=20

They are to blame as much as anyone else

Re: CDC coronavirus testing decision likely to haunt nation for months to come

#84

Post by mikeyouse »

majormajor wrote: post #55
h2odragon wrote: post #47

Where was the media in this? Lots of scare stories about potential pandemics back to January, in the US media, but I dont recall much if any "the CDC is fucking up / not testing" coverage. Of course that kind of thing was probably being said in the froth of the fringe and conspiracy theorists, but thats all "fake news" and unmentionable now.

I don't remember the exact start date when people started noticing we had severely fucked this up, but it's been a common refrain in the media for the last month at least. If you're still asking "where was the media" NOW then you need to seriously reevaluate what media you're paying attention to, because the ones you're looking at are doing you a big disservice. Here's one from a month ago: https://www.latimes.com/wo…

Feb 1st in Business Insider: https://www.businessinsider.com/tests-for-coronavirus-us-mig...

Feb 12th in the NYTimes: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/12/health/coronavirus-test-k...

Feb 12th in LiveScience: https://www.livescience.com/coronavirus-testing-kits-flawed....

Feb 12th from Physicians Weekly: https://www.physiciansweekly.com/some-u-s-states-launch/

Feb 13th on FoxNews: https://www.foxnews.com/health/some-coronavirus-testing-kits...

The media has been all over this, news stories just don't have the penetrating power they used to. Plus, Trump admin officials kept saying the tests were fixed and would be shipped shortly even though it was patently false, so I don't think people thought much of it.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-03-06/trump-aid...

Re: CDC coronavirus testing decision likely to haunt nation for months to come

#86

Post by mikeyouse »

throwaway122378 wrote: post #83
h2odragon wrote: post #47

Where was the media in this? Lots of scare stories about potential pandemics back to January, in the US media, but I dont recall much if any "the CDC is fucking up / not testing" coverage. Of course that kind of thing was probably being said in the froth of the fringe and conspiracy theorists, but thats all "fake news" and unmentionable now.

On 1/24/20 the WHO said there’s no human to human transmission of covid-19 https://twitter.com/WHO/status/1217043229427761152?s=20 They are to blame as much as anyone else

WHO isn't faultless, but that's a fairly misrepresentative version of what that Tweet actually says..

"WHO said there's no human to human transmission" vs.

> Preliminary investigations conducted by the Chinese authorities have found no clear evidence of human-to-human transmission of the novel #coronavirus (2019-nCoV) identified in #Wuhan, #China.

Re: CDC coronavirus testing decision likely to haunt nation for months to come

#87

Post by munk-a »

dominotw wrote: post #75
BoiledCabbage wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> No way that is possibly true. People realised they didn't have tests. A bunch of people of a liberterian bent or systems thinkers would have picked the FDA as the problem very quickly. You didn't need a "libertarian bent" or special"systems thinking" to figure that out. The CDC was testing at most 50 people a day IIRC. Can 50 tests across an entire country get you detailed info? No. You need labs to run tests, CDC…

> The administration let the country down enormously. Is this a failing of current democratic system. Are there no check and balances for this sort of let down by the administration. How can we design a system that has nothing to check it if its making mistakes. Is that the job of the opposition or does opposition lack intelligence to find out in time.

I think so, I've emigrated up to Canada and comparing the parliamentary government up here to the system in the US has been interesting. Canada has had some majorly extreme parties over the years (including the PPC[1]) but there is room in the system for these parties to grow outside of the centrist parties. Currently in Canada the dominant party is the Liberal party it's a rather centrist but socially liberal party that's about equivalent of America's corporate Democrat types like Clinton and Pelosi - but in recent elections a more left leaning party has gained some ground and is challenging them from the outside.

There is a lot of party loyalty in Canada, but since the political field isn't purely divided between Liberal and Conservative there's significantly more freedom when it comes to elections, the election system is still first past the post but most voters can vote their conscience rather than strategically.

I think the failure of the democratic system is reducing elections to a binary vote, and I think that that reduction is impossible to avoid with direct election of the executive branch instead of being driven by the composition of the congress - additionally America's system is very vulnerable to having a minority party executive and while minority governments in parliamentary systems is a thing, it tends to be less damaging by still ensuring/requiring that a minority government is able to form a coalition government initially.

1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/People%27s_Party_of_Canada

Re: CDC coronavirus testing decision likely to haunt nation for months to come

#88

Post by omgJustTest »

throwaway122378 wrote: post #82
omgJustTest wrote: post #61

This article does not mention the WHO offered tests to the US before the CDC decided it should make its own[1]. This alone should have been enough to bring impeachment charges against public officials, for criminal neglect. If the WHO had proven these in China, and you have no other alternative, it make sense to do both 1. buy tests you know are in active use and 2. make your own tests if needed. Someone at the CDC m…

What’s your point? The WHO lost all credibility. As late as January 14, 2020 the WHO tweeted that there is NO evidence of human to human transmission of covid-19 https://twitter.com/WHO/status/1217043229427761152?s=20

"Preliminary investigations conducted by the Chinese authorities have found no clear evidence of human-to-human transmission of the novel #coronavirus (2019-nCoV) identified in #Wuhan, #China," - WHO.

Sounds like these were preliminary results, which would have been well rectified by February. Wuhan was under quarantine Jan 23.

There is a substantial difference in being wrong a month or so after a new virus is discovered, and being wrong after a country has been shutdown for nearly a month.

EDIT: Updated for correct date Jan 23, not Jan 29, of Wuhan shutdown.

Re: CDC coronavirus testing decision likely to haunt nation for months to come

#89

Post by Svip »

merpnderp wrote: post #52
h2odragon wrote: post #47

Where was the media in this? Lots of scare stories about potential pandemics back to January, in the US media, but I dont recall much if any "the CDC is fucking up / not testing" coverage. Of course that kind of thing was probably being said in the froth of the fringe and conspiracy theorists, but thats all "fake news" and unmentionable now.

Because in the initial days, the CDC had a valid point. The W.H.O/Chinese test wasn't that reliable (at the time) and it wasn't unreasonable for the US to make their own. It wasn't until week after week went by, with the CDC straight up lying to the FDA/HHS, that the real failure became apparent. The second the CDC realized it wasn't up to the job, it should have begged the FDA to allow labs/companies to make their o…

> Because in the initial days, the CDC had a valid point. The W.H.O/Chinese test wasn't that reliable (at the time) and it wasn't unreasonable for the US to make their own. It wasn't until week after week went by, with the CDC straight up lying to the FDA/HHS, that the real failure became apparent.

The initial test was developed in Germany, and was ready by 17 January. This test proved able to isolate the virus from other coronaviruses, and thus received the recommendation of the WHO. CDC published its protocol on 28 January, a test that was less efficient and reliable than the German test. In the mean time, WHO had recommended countries use the German protocol.

Re: CDC coronavirus testing decision likely to haunt nation for months to come

#90

Post by nohat »

grey-area wrote: post #46
nohat wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's exponentially easier to respond to an outbreak the earlier you act, but our early response was hamstrung by the CDC and FDA (and complete apathy from the white house). We could have slowed or halted this in the early stages with better testing. At the least it would have confirmed how much community spread there already was and hopefully prodded the gov, states, and businesses into action sooner. Time matters. I…

This lacklustre response is still going on, the federal government simply isn’t taking this seriously. Trump saying things will open up in just a few weeks and it’s important to restart the economy will cost thousands of lives by encouraging states not to lock down. Full lock down is now the only way out, and as it has spread, that will take months. Testing needs to massively ramp up too. 2000 people died in one day…

Yes, its infuriating but hardly surprising. This is what happens when you don't have a responsible adult in charge during a crisis. The economy does matter, but the longer we wait, the longer we'll have to endure a crippling lockdown. So far some governors have filled in for the missing executive function of this country. Unfortunately that's localized and states simply cannot apply the same level of resources or coordination that the federal government can.
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