Did you know: A test *not* performed has a sensitivity of 0% for symptomatic and asymptomatic ppl A test w a 48 hr delay has 0% during the days of waiting I talk a lot about sensitivity- but if we want to detect infectious people - frequency of testing is even more important.

“Quarantine is an information problem that happens when we dont know who is infectious after exposure”

“Rapid testing… allows people to learn within minutes whether they are…contagious… infectious people can stay home and quarantine before they infect others. Everybody else can carry on with life” David Leonhardt writes in The New York Times “Where are the Tests?” nytimes.com/2021/09/21/bri…

Entering a meeting COVID testing crisis. Best thing we can do is scale tests by enabling more high quality rapid tests into the market We have to be like Europe & evaluate tests on correct PUBLIC HEALTH metrics: speed, access, detection of infectious virus only

This is how we should have made rapid tests accessible middle of last year. US is the wealthiest nation in the world and arguably the most advanced for bio technologies. Yet we still haven’t given Americans the tools to know if they are infectious We CAN and should do better

Today's news about what appears to be a highly effective pill is welcome, to add to the anti-Covid armamentarium. What is missing, big, and for a long time, is this, and it needs to/can get fixed STAT: nytimes.com/2021/10/01/opi… New York Times Opinion by Michael Mina and Steven Phillips

Many ppl still disregard frequent fast testing - to know if infectious before infecting others - as useful Rapid tests are >90% accurate to detect most infectious levels of virus & could be used daily I ask simply: What better tool is there to slow transmission & support vacc?

We could have saved many lives if: - we treated the virus as airborne until proven otherwise -we focused on getting *everyone* better masks from the very start -we utilized rapid antigen tests as a public health tool rather than a medical diagnostic /1 #covid19

“A test not performed has 0% sensitivity.”

HUGE News! White House finally recognizing crucial need for rapid tests as we get through this most recent wave of COVID (& after 700K lives lost) This is good news & a show of support for public health from the White House and the FDA However... 1/ washingtonpost.com/health/2021/10…

Test-to-Stay needs to be national policy for all Schools: preschools & K-12+ We should not let Covid be an information problem - accurate rapid testing keeps students in school safely & ensures no unnecessary quarantines It saved 18 person-years of school in 1 week in MA.

Important Highly effective Merck and Pfizer COVID Treatments are likely to gain FDA EUA soon (I presume) Both must be started within the first days of symptoms. More reason to have RAPID tests in your cupboard. If you wait days for a lab test, the meds won’t work well

When even CDC is describing rapid tests as tools meant to protect OTHERS… we have to wonder why these tools continue to be regulated as medical devices when it is abundantly clear from both CDC and President Donald J. Trump that these are most often Public Health tools. We need an adjustment

Why we need to have *test-to-stay* programs for school. Your child MIGHT have been exposed? Keep at home straight for 10-14+ days? NO. Thats harmful. Test each AM for 7 days. Each day Neg -> Go to school Quarantines are information problems. Rapid test solve this issue.

The sensitivity of a test not-taken is 0%. An 'only-90%-sensitive' covid test used at-scale could have (and could still) fundamentally change the trajectory of the pandemic. It's sad & tragic the FDA & CDC are still using the wrong lens in this crisis.

The FDA's excessive conservatism on covid test review/approval hasn't enabled supply & demand to provide enough low-cost tests now when we need them most. A great 🧵 on the problem (and how it can be solved) from Michael Mina ...

I believe this is one of the most important articles written this entire pandemic It hits on a topic that is central to our failed pandemic response Public Health is not just a lot of Medicine stacked up. Medicine can even be anti-public health 1/ nytimes.com/2022/01/14/opi…

I post this regularly, and many express surprise. This is the current childhood immunization schedule. Many childhood vaccines are three+ doses, sometimes a booster. This is one reason why, unlike earlier centuries, we don't have cemeteries full of children. We've forgotten.

Hmm, a covid test for about the price of a latte. Great to see it; wish it would have been ~18 months ago, like it could/should have been. @OpenCovidScreen #FFCE