But it's an inaccurate number unless you test the entire country, whether they have symtoms or not. As the situation currently presents itself, that would be a horrible waste of resources.
Mass-testing a waste?
Do we have enough tests to mail out to people so they can do it at home on their own?
330 million tests.
If not - yes. A waste. And likely counterproductive.
A good example of panic media being extremely dangerous. 300 people dead trying to prevent a bug that they likely would have recovered from on their own with zero drugs.
Drive through, I am sure you are familiar with the concept.
Just tell Americans there is a new chicken sandwich out and they'll be lining up!
A waste of resources you say? Take a gander at the spending stimulus bill:
Roughly 3 billion going towards foreign aid? And then all the extras...
So instead of self-quarantine and shelter in place, we're going to get everyone in a car and line them up at a McDonalds drive thru? I'm sure that would be handled with calmness. What about people who don't have a car? Think they won't just bum a ride from folks they otherwise would have had zero contact with?
I vote no.
Waste of resources and counter-productive.
I agree about the bullshit extras in the stimulus bill. Shameful.
People are already doing that. Fast food places are allowed open even though we are supposed to be on lock-down. Liquor stores are open as we speak here in Ohio. Going out for booze and shit food is ok, but for testing you have second thoughts?
Half convincing smile, a slight look of terror in his eyes... yeah, quite the morale boost there.
You lock down liquor stores in Ohio you have a whole other set of problems. Haha.
If you open up testing at a drive thru you will have a panic rush to get tested. It would make the toilet paper mania look like nothing.
But - IF you can figure out a way to do it orderly where you aren't increasing likelihood of spreading the virus and IF we have enough tests and IF we aren't taking medical personnel away from people who are sick and need care, I'm fine with it.
Everything is open here except bars and restaurants barbers etc.B.C. published a list a mile long of essential services yesterday and the premier said if you can go to work you should go to work.it is business as usual. No lockdown here
There's nothing stopping us from testing everybody in the US in a pretty rapid manner.
The most important thing is figuring out who to start with. This could be start of a strategy to putting people back to work more quickly than we currently can without data.
There are test that are less than $10. But let's go with the $100 test. Because the US is silly at everything about this. But also because testing has a wide variation in sensitivity and specificity right now because of so many manufacturers.
$100 test for 300 million Americans means $30 billion.
We're spending a trillion or two on a shotgun approach because we can't be surgical.
As I see it the biggest limitation is simply manufacturing capacity of those tests versus the current onslaught because we waited so long to start creating those tests. As such by the time I create the test we have too much exponential spread. So you're forced to shelter in place anyway.
But don't totally discount broad testing. This is a very serious part of getting us back to work and life faster than doing it in a blind trickle.
Ideally such broad testing would look like a combination of modalities.
Drive-thru testing at home testing would both be of major importance.
I would think you'd probably have to start with the younger crowd. They are the most mobile and the most asymptomatic. They're also most likely to be job producers. So you'd have to come up with some strategy to test that crowd And you could sign off that they have the green light to move around. They could also be employed and temporary assistance positions so that as people recover or find out they were asymptomatic infections they become useful for all those old people that need to not catch this until there is a vaccine.
I'm kind of waxing poetic here but you get the idea. Broad testing is not unaffordable. It's just a question of strategy. Though I do agree with you based on manufacturing limits it isn't really a solution right now. We just missed the boat.
The firemen here are doing Drive thru testing at the fire department. I think 25 of the first 100 tested are positive. I think it boosted us to 3rd place in our area with numbers.
We can't shelter in place forever. And I think people are contagious before they know they have it.
A positive test would make people take the sheltering more seriously. And negative ones can go back to work.
I think everyone should be tested. I think they should have people submit for a test online and they give you a date to come and test.
With the economy completely shut down, cost is irrelevant IMO. We already spent $2 trillion we don't have.
You don't think that would overwhelm the medical practitioners who are already busy as shit?
Don't get me wrong - I agree mass testing would be awesome. I just don't know how feasible it is at this point.