Last week Colorado’s Governor Polis made at-home covid tests available, free, to all residents. Eight tests per order, per person. Businesses can order in bulk.
I’m especially grateful, as I often have to travel into decidedly not as cautious NE to look in on my parents who are high-risk (but vaccinated because they aren’t covidiots).
Mine arrived today. Hopefully, I won’t even have to crack them open. But I do wish they’d authorize a second J&J shot, then I’d feel better.
How’s your night going? Open thread
SpaceUnit
I’m also in Colorado, but was not aware of this. Good on Governor Polis.
The somewhat cooler weather lately has been a Godsend. I’ve got all my windows open, enjoying the less-smokey air.
zhena gogolia
I’m hoping for that second J&J for my husband too. I hope they hurry up.
I hope all the critters are okay.
StringOnAStick
Polis has been an excellent Governor. I miss having him as my Gov, but I’m enjoying Kate Brown as my Gov in our new location. Unfortunately the covidiots from the ungovernable eastern Oregon regions are slamming our local hospital system. The next door neighbour needs new hips but he has to have heart surgery first and can’t get it currently thanks to unvaccinated morons packing the hospital to way past full.
jl
Thanks for post. Glad to see the US finally making at least some baby steps towards better covid control policy needed to get back to a new actually normal normal way of life.
We need a lot more of this. Dozens of countries now have experience using rapid antigen tests, which are a great public health tool to get society moving, businesses, gyms, coffee joints, concerts, etc. open, people out and about again.
In many countries, there are bins of this kind of test in supermarkets, every drug store, quick markets, for fifty cents or a buck in US money. Or free. Here in the US we have I think two approved tests and they cost something like 12 bucks each and last I heard, in very short supply.
Over 30 tests are stuck in the FDA waiting forever for approval, because the FDA has no understanding or protocol for public health tests, as opposed to tests used in clinical care. So the applications have just been sitting there. Edit: and US manufacturers are stamping out 100s of millions of them at a few cents a piece and exporting them all over the world, so we could be flooded with them if we had an actual public health system in this country.
Michael Mina’s twitter account is a good place to read the about the different kinds of tests and how they should be used.
https://twitter.com/michaelmina_lab
This Michael Mina a physician/epidemiologist who runs one of the largest PCR testing sites in the country. And pre covid, he is known for proving the 100 year old hypothesis that a measles infection erases most of your infectious disease immune system, and takes several years to recover. So, measles is a far deadlier disease than commonly understood, and its toll is vastly underestimated.
This Mina claims he did a combo cooking demo and covid test segment on some internet show with the chef Michael Mina, but I can’t a clip of it anyplace.
mrmoshpotato
Abbot and Costello Meet Frankenstein was on Svengoolie tonight.
It was extra hilarious.
Matt McIrvin
This is great. Here, it’s hard to even find these tests at drug stores. When I needed one, all they had in stock was a more expensive variant that works through a phone app.
jl
@Matt McIrvin: I don’t know whether it is illegal or not, probably technically it is, but I’ve read that people coming back from overseas are buying up handfuls of them for cheap, and hiding them in their luggage so they have a good supply here.
The rapid testing mess in the US is a total disgrace. Fauci has been pounding the table to get them in the US for months and months, but even our Dear Public Health Dictator (from what Rand Paul says) can’t get anything moving on it to really solve the problem.
Major Major Major Major
Nice! That’s great. They were handing them out at work last week.
Today we went up to Chappaqua to visit a former coworker of mine who moved there last year. Hadn’t seen him since, and yep he sure did have a kid and his puppy sure did grow up. Glad to confirm he’s a good enough friend to visit after a long time not chatting and pick up where you left off!
I also did the day’s writing on my phone on the train which was a new experience, trying to do that seriously. So weird.
lamh36
Just FYI warning…the rapid testing like these are known for having false positives.
So if you do the at home test and its positive, might still be a good idea to get the PCR NAAT testing.
Oh and hey guys!
I’ve used the Abbott Binax IDNow rapid test in the lab. In this case you use a POC machine, but still my understanding is the concept is the same.
Starboard Tack
I’m satisfied so far with Polis. He’s done well with Covid. I feel pretty safe here and I’ve put off a scheduled trip outside the state for more than a year. I expect Polis gets reeelected next year and hope Bugs Gun Bunny gets a pink slip.
jl
@lamh36: Mina says that some of the tests that are read by a machine tend to have false positive rates that are way too high to be reliable. Apparently the quality varies wildly. And since the FDA has no clear guidance on what to do with tests that are used for public health rather than clinical diagnosis, it’s approved some that are too inaccurate and not approved others that dominate in FPR and FNR.
The most important thing for everyone to remember about these quick antigen tests is that they are tests of whether you are currently infectious, not whether you have been infected. Those are two different issues.
If you take one because you have covid like symptoms, or if you take one and get a positive result, you need to see your health provider, get a PCR test, etc. to find out what is going on.
The public health use of these tests is for asymptomatic people to spend 10 minutes or so taking them, get the results immediately, and know with high probability whether they are infectious or not. If they are, and they are not sociopaths, they’ll stay home and call their doc.
Edit: the experience in over a dozen countries indicates that the vast majority of people are not sociopaths, or goofballs, and enough people take these tests to allow society to open up, since most people who take them get accurate results and do stay home.
jl
Since open thread, looks like Sinema watched Gottheimer make a damned fool of himself, turn himself into a ridiculous figure in front of the whole country, with his tantrum letter about the delay on the BIF and Biden’s reminder that he’ll damn well do what he’s said he’d do for months.
And… she decided to do the exact same thing…
@sahilkapur
@SenatorSinema
unloads after the House delays a vote on her infrastructure bill:
“inexcusable, and deeply disappointing for communities across our country.”
“ineffective stunt to gain leverage over a separate proposal”
“betrays the trust the American people have placed”
https://twitter.com/sahilkapur/status/1444355616613539854
Edit: I’ve read elsewhere that Sinema is flooding AZ with political promos of how she is really delivering Rock Candy Mountain with gumdrop farting unicorns and cotton candy clouds with the BIF, ignoring the reconciliation bill entirely. She seems to think that the BIF is the secret to solidifying her McCainy maverick cred, dribbling out enough crumbs to the lesser people, keeping her big donors happy by quashing the reconciliation bill, and solving all political problems forever. She has very poor judgment, IMHO.
Kalakal
I went on the Novavax clinical trial
While the trials showed very good results Novavax seem to have left the participants in limbo since, they’ve pushed back FDA submission since March, no advice on boosters or mixing with other vaccines and a CDC vax card that is not recognised by a lot of places.
As I’m in Florida and work involves quite a bit of public exposure I’m a touch concerned.
Words cannot describe my feelings about DeSantis
MagdaInBlack
@jl: Oh my, the replies on her twitter feed are not in her favor. Jeezuz ,she’s a dumbass !
jl
@Kalakal: I’ve read that Novavax is prioritizing selling to middle and lower income countries, and has delayed submitting applications for US approval. Their vaccine has great advantages in countries that don’t have infrastructure for the cold chain needed for other vaccines. And then there are the delays manufacturing facilities licensed.
If anyone knows more about it, please comment.
IMHO, this shows that allowing this sort of IP and private corporation decision making without any cooperation with the feds at all results in continuing piss poor performance of the US in pandemic control.
Chetan Murthy
@jl: Hush now, next you’ll be telling us that the Internet couldn’t have been built without Federal leadership!
jl
@Chetan Murthy: It sure is a good thing those useless pointy-headed intellectual ‘scientists’ at those damn colleges kept their fingers out of it. Boy, they’d have really messed it up.
Auntie Anne
I was able to pick up 2 tests for free at my local library as soon as they were available. I gave them to my 86 year-old father who KNOWS Covid would be a death sentence for him; I wanted him to have the reassurance of having the test in hand, just in case. But, I gave them to him with the caveat that if he used one and got a positive result, we’ll be headed to get a pcr test immediately.
in other weird vax news, my sister works retail, and one of her coworkers has been steadfastly anti-vax (reasons not specified). He’s quarantined about three times for covid exposure (!). He’s just gotten his first shot because he plans to fly somewhere and vaccination is required. The guy is a real jerk, so I can’t pretend to care much . . . But I am glad she won’t be exposed through him. And I told her the minute that Moderna boosters are approved, we’re getting ours.
piratedan
@lamh36: we run the same policy here at our shop…. the POC is not to be used as a clinical designator, but they get used for an initial triage of sorts.
The PCR is the one that meets the clinical threshold standard in our shop as well. Understand that not every locale has a clinical laboratory nearby, so you do what you can with what you have.
Kalakal
@jl: The last I heard from the lab that did the trial was about a month ago saying Novavx were were wa on the cdc decision on boosters since then crickets.
you’re right about their priorities, lasr week they applied to the WHO for EA which is encouraging and have been signing up contracts in India, Japan and others.
In the UK there is trial using pfizer as a booster but there seem to be a lot of people also in limbo
To add insult to injury they recently sent out a tweet thanking all the volunteers and how wonderful we all are, they couldn’t have done it without us etc. You can imagine the replies
West of the Rockies
Glad Newsom in CA is mandating vaccines for eligible school kids. I’m so happy that the recall was a big, fat loser for the wingers here.
Major Major Major Major
@Auntie Anne: My gut says I should get my Moderna booster in November. 4/1 was my last dose
Chetan Murthy
@Major Major Major Major: uh, I’d read 6mos or more after your last dose? Did you read that a longer interval was recommended ?
jl
@Kalakal: Thanks for info.
I think Novavax is benefiting from public funding, from other countries if not from the US. Edit: were they in Warp Speed, or get any guaranteed sales deals in the US, I don’t think so but not sure. They do have some very large pre-approval purchase agreements with other countries, that is, guaranteed pay before they know the vaccine works well enough to be used.
Moderna, Pfizer, and others are all showing that despite their high toned rhetoric, profits come first.
I’m not a medical ethics expert by any means, but how Novavax is treating its trial subjects seems sketchy to me. Subjects are supposed to get a reasonable risk-reward deal out of their participation. Is ‘hey thanks for contributing to science and our profits, good luck figuring out what our vaccine means in your country’ good enough? And… if you are high risk, do they owe you a booster if it turns out you need one?
Kalakal
@jl: From what I gather the vaccine works very well, their problem seems to scaling up to mass production They’ve certainly had long enough since the cdc ruling to start delivering the boosters they said they’d give, the US trial was about 30,000 people.
They seem to have decided that commercially they’ll be to late to the US party as they’ve stated they want to wait on fda approval until they’ve finished trialling a combo of their covid & flu vaccines.
If they don’t get their act together they’fe going to find it very hard to get volunteers for future trials, it’s already big news in the UK
They got a lot of funding from the US govt
jl
@Kalakal: Countries should have a rule that if there is a covid drug or vaccine trial in their territory, it is first in line to get applications for approval, and trial subjects get treated on equal basis wrt to drug/vaccine as in any other country. IMHO. Country can, probably should, offer financial assistance or something to the company get it done asap. Companies probably don’t deserve it, but General Honore’s advice that some ‘disaster capitalism’ cannot be avoided in an emergency holds here.
You folks shouldn’t be left in limbo. Seems to me that is definitely unethical, and both company and countries that can set the rules have an obligation to the trial subjects.
frosty
My night went really well. Three days ago my iPhone SE glitched and wouldn’t shut off. I got on the phone with Apple Support (who were really good BTW) who walked me through various things, none of which worked. Finally we decided to reset it to factory and the tech had me make a backup first. That didn’t work either.
So I restored it from backup … and iTunes couldn’t do it because the backup was corrupted. Apple doesn’t tell you that when you make it, the bastards. After a couple of nights of internet searching I found one third-party software that claimed it could repair corrupted backups for $29.95. The reviews were amazingly good, so I plunked down the money and … restoration failed.
But wait! The software told me to try the Advanced Restoration which fixes problems from bad hard disk sectors. I did and OMG IT WORKED!!! ALL MY DATA AND APPS ARE BACK!! And in the meantime the phone decided to fix itself and shut down when it’s supposed to.
I’ll be cancelling my appointment with the Geniuses tomorrow. And making more regular backups from now on.
Kalakal
@jl: I agree. What I want from them is advice from them on
Chetan Murthy
@Kalakal: This is a terrible situation, and due only to your desire to, y’know, be a good citizen and help defeat this pandemic. I’m appalled. Have you thought about writing the FDA, the CDC, and (ding ding) your Congresscritter (assuming they’re Dem; I would guess a GrOPer won’t care much, but hey, I could be wrong) ?
Maybe also writing some journalists. Maybe Rachel Maddow might want to do a segment on this ?
This would be ridiculous, if it weren’t so life-threatening.
Kalakal
@Chetan Murthy: I’m working up to that, at the moment I’m pestering Novavax, Im at the 6 month mark since end of course.
My congress critter is Bilirakis, the senators are Scott and Rubio so not a lot of help there.
The FDA and the CDC though…
Major Major Major Major
@Chetan Murthy: I mean it’s not even authorized for general use anyway. I can’t get it. There are no recommendations for Moderna boosters for the general population.
The administration initially said eight months which makes sense to me based on the real world data we’re seeing for the Moderna. Pfizer makes sense to get sooner.
Chetan Murthy
@Kalakal: I’m sorry, but I feel compelled to ask: do you know which arm you were in? The treatment arm? or the control arm? What I’m asking is, did you get an actual vaccine, or a placebo? At this point, given that Novavax is leaving you to dangle, that’s the first thing I’d want to know. There are antibody titer tests that can measure that, yes? B/c FFS, I’d want to know that I’m not walking around unvaccinated b/c Novavax can’t get their asses together ….
Second thought: have you investigated whether it is safe for you to get a different vaxx? That is, just act as if you haven’t gotten a vaxx at all, and go get it? I HASTEN TO ADD that I’m not saying you should do that right away: just find out if it’s SAFE. I have to believe it is, but hey, the human immune system is a complex beast, so best to find out. I would bet that among all the many, many immunologists who blog, tweet, etc, you might be able to find a way to get one of them to help you reach people who know the answer to that question. I’d bet that there are people at the FDA and NIH (contact Dr. Fauci!) who know the answer.
Again, I’m so sorry you’re stuck like this, in what might be a life-threatening situation.
JustRuss
Since the thread’s open, shout out to the Oregon State Beavers for beating the Huskies for the first time in 9 years, with a field goal at the last second. And to coach Jonathan Smith for clock management and trusting his place kicker who missed two attempts earlier in the game.
Kalakal
@Chetan Murthy: Yes, I got the real thing.
Your second question about another vax is one I’m trying to get an answer to.
If this goes on long enough that’s what I’ll do.
I have to be a little cautious as I have a history of anaphyllactic shock (that’s for wasps) , though I’ve never had any problem with vaccines and I’ve had a lot, I grew up in Indonesia and the middle East
brendancalling
I’m in Montréal visiting with the boy. His mom—aka “the best babymama ever”—sprang for Korean BBQ tonight. Stepdad and I had a bunch of good laughs, we all had a great time.
Next weekend’s on me, and I’m feeling like a lucky guy tonight.
Redshift
In the governor’s race here in Virginia, McAuliffe is making vaccine mandates a solid part of his campaign, trying to use it as a wedge issue since the GOPer needs the support of the MAGAts and independents. Youngkin is trying to get away with “I encourage people to get vaccinated but I’m against requiring it.” Dems are hoping that doesn’t appeal to either group enough to motivate them to turn out.
I sure hope it works (and I think chances are pretty good.) We really need to have Republican candidates see even trying to play footsie with anti-vaxxers as a loser.
Chetan Murthy
@Kalakal: Googling around (I’m sure you’ve seen ’em too) I see that *Novavax* are supposed to be distributing proof-of-vaxx cards to you and your trial cohort. That (I assume) is the nonstandard not-recognized-everywhere CDC card to which you alluded. Ugh. This is mad.
I read that some participants (after having been unblinded) are proceeding to get boosters of other vaxxes. So at some point soon, there should be data on whether that’s safe.
Kalakal
@Chetan Murthy: Yep, thats the card.
Yes I certainly hope there’s data soon
Thank you, I appreciate your comments
James E Powell
@brendancalling:
Happy for you. And, no doubt, you had a hand in making that luck.
LiminalOwl
@frosty: I’ve had the same problem, minus the solution. Would you kindly share the name of the miracle software? (If you want to contact me off-list, I give WaterGirl permission to share my email address.) thanks!
Burnspbesq
Sore arm from Friday’s PFE booster is gone. Makes up for the pain of seeing a potential game-winning goal for Everton against ManUHated disallowed for offside.
Many of my favorite artists are not scheduling shows in Texas; wonder if it’s because of COVID insanity. Seeing Punch Brothers in January in Oklahoma City. Nearest shows on Bela Fleck’s “My Bluegrass Heart” tour are Salina, KS and Tucson. Might have to do the long-overdue trip to see the kid in OC.
Steeplejack (phone)
@Burnspbesq:
Many acts are specifically saying it’s because of no vax or mask requirements at the venues.
frosty
@LiminalOwl: Apologies for not mentioning it in my post, that was an obvious thing I should have done. Decipher Media: Backup Repair.
J R in WV
@Major Major Major Major:
We just got our 3rd Moderna shot at the (next-door) county Health Dept, which was giving no question asked shots to use up vaccine doses nearing expiration date. Could have gotten Pfizer or Moderna.
Full dose, same as original shots. They actually did look us up in the state vaccine database, and then the EMT giving the shots asked us which vaccine we needed. We were in and out in less than half an hour! Back in late August, really hot out.
Miss Bianca
@SpaceUnit: I was aware of it from reporting for the local radio station – we have someone on board who is our COVID maven and keeps us all up to date. I may just have to order some of these.
ETA: Now I just wish Polis and CDE would stop fucking around and do updated mask and vaccine mandates for schools. A girl can dream, I suppose…
James E Powell
@J R in WV:
Got my third Pfizer at my local Walgreens here in SW Riverside County, California. Six months + one week after my 2nd shot.
The only reason it took more than ten minutes was that there were quite a few people getting 1st & 2nd shots. This is deep Trump country, so I’m guessing work requirements?
way2blue
I’m waiting for the Moderna vaccine to be approved for boosters… Waiting. Waiting…
Mark Arnest
Many thanks for posting this, from another Coloroadoan who was unaware of the program, and has just signed up! (I don’t teach a lot, but enough to be concerned …)