ICYMI: I went back and really listened to what @StLukesHealth's Chief Medical Officer, Dr. Jim Souza, told the @CDHidaho board about #COVID19 testing in Idaho because I think it's critically important to the conversation right now, so I'm going to share it in a series of tweets:
2/ “We’re going to be in a scarcity situation for the foreseeable future as long as I can see. We need to get clear about those priority tiers and the allocation of testing resources to those tiers. Let me just state this clearly for the group: ..."
3/ "If asked to prioritize a student returning to school, or an athlete in order to perform at an event, or a vulnerable patient about to be admitted to a long term care facility, I think there is no question who we will need to prioritize in a scarcity situation. None at all."
4/ "This Conversation about testing, testing, testing... that’s fine, but we need to be talking about prevention, protection and mitigation. Testing is sort of a little caboose, that’s sort of an appendage to that conversation. It supports those things." ...
5/ "Using @GovernorLittle's own analogy about a forest fire, talking about testing is like talking about the ways you’re measuring the fire; it’s heat, how many trees burned, how many structures were consumed, we’ve got to start talking about how we’re going to douse the fire."
6/ "...We have real ways our communities and the public can engage in that. I’m very interested in that conversation..."
7/ "...as we get a more firm bead on the actual capacity that exists at the Bureau of Laboratories, within health care systems, inside reference labs, to the degree which we hone down those top tier priorities that we have to deliver on, perhaps we will find additional capacity."
8/ "I believe that additional capacity, whether it’s at @StLukesHealth, @SaintAlsHealth, the Bureau of Laboratories, the VA, @CrushTheCurveID, you name it, that additional capacity has to be allocated centrally in a consistent way because..."
9/ "...what we’re doing right now is consuming a resource that we know we’re going to run out of, and we’re not consuming those resources in way that is logical and consistent with a scarcity situation and delivering the testing to the people who need it the most.” -Dr. Jim Souza
