America Botched Coronavirus Testing. We're About to Find Out Just How Badly.

America Botched Coronavirus Testing. We're About to Find Out Just How Badly.

SYSTEM FAILURE


A growing maze of tests and labs are starting to expose the American pandemic as one that resembles an Italy-style disaster.

Bryn Nelson at Daily Beast

Published Mar. 18, 2020 12:11PM ET 

"SNIP....

Keith Jerome thinks he’s onto something.

As director of the University of Washington Virology Lab, Jerome and his colleagues have been working to develop an alternative that would allow patients to be tested for the 2019 novel coronavirus where they’re receiving care—and get results within an hour. Reducing the current time lag of a day or more could greatly speed up treatment of COVID-19 cases as infection and death mount across the country, he explained.

“We’re trying to make this something that’s not a whole lot more complicated than a pregnancy test,” Jerome told The Daily Beast from his office inside America’s first COVID-19 hot zone. Producing more rapid tests will require the lab to build in shortcuts that don’t compromise accuracy, to gain FDA approval, and to partner with manufacturers to produce the test kits. 

.......

In Canada, Kindrachuk said a test based on the WHO’s recipe has been distributed throughout the country, allowing provincial, territorial and local labs to conduct their initial screens in pop-up locations. “They’re increasing the accessibility for people, which is fantastic,” he said. “Also, they’re not requiring people to go to clinics or hospitals for testing, which reduces the burden on those facilities.”

Although those tests require confirmation by the National Microbiology Laboratory in Winnipeg, the presumptive positive results can allow for very quick decisions on isolation measures and contact tracing to identify other potential cases. “We need to have coordination to be able to maximize the amount of information we can get out in the shortest amount of time possible to be able to get patients identified, as well as their potential contacts identified,” Kindrachuk added.  



......SNIP"