They are saying there are sufficient tests to be used daily or weekly by many many Americans in the coming weeks, but the actual number of tests they are distributing is no where near what is needed....
2/
Distribution of 30 million rapid tests per month may sound like a lot, but across the US, it is 1 test per person per year!
This is not near the type of rapid test volume that is needed to make a major impact...
3/
Instead the federal government CAN take responsibility and take ownership of testing, instead of simply purchasing what’s available.
The WH need to take a leadership role and actually oversee these tests at a volume that can in fact live up to Trump’s (false) hype...
4/
Pence just said we are doing 3M tests per day. This is false. Not even close.
He is saying the new deployment of these tests will open up America’s schools. Clearly he hasn’t done the basic math. How far can 1M rapid tests per day go to actually keep schools safe?...
5/
Don’t get me wrong, these rapid tests can and will likely be crucial to control this virus. But the math here just doesn’t add up. They need to appropriate not $750M but $20B to produce them with defense production act or other in much greater quantities... 10-20x
If $20B sounds like a lot... it isn’t. Its a small fraction of the losses and COVID stimulus bills that have and will continue to be put in place. A very small fraction.
There’s no reason the WH and congress are not being more proactive with testing and scale up of these tests
One clarification... while frustrated with lack of initiative by WH (understatement), this is progress.
It’s slow, but better than him getting to podium and saying nothing new with testing is happening.
So, a positive announcement, but couched in hyperbole and half truths.
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For a number of decades, syphilis has been trending up in the U.S.
The cause isn’t singularly but likely is associated with relaxations of prevention of STIs in the context of more effective prophylaxis for HIV (PrEP). Plus general lack of awareness
When left untreated, Syphilis can have devastating consequences on human health
Luckily there is very simple treatment for it (a form of Penicillin) but it only works if you take it - and you only take it if you know you have syphilis
Here we go again with this asinine cautious approach to testing for H5N1
CDC is NOT recommending that people with no symptoms - but who have had contact w infected animals - be tested at all… and certainly are not recommending a swab w any frequency.
Though we should have learned it in 2020, Here’s why this doesnt make sense:
1/
Firstly, tests are our eyes for viruses. It’s literally how we see where viruses are
If we wait until people are getting sick, we may have missed a major opportunity to find viruses jumping into humans before they learn to become so efficient in us that they cause disease
2/
So waiting until we actually have highly pathogenic strains harming humans - when we have a pretty discreet population at the moment to survey - is short sighted
3/
A particularly deadly consequence of measles is its erasure of previously acquired immune memory - setting kids and adults up for infections that they shouldn’t be at risk from!
We found for example that measles can eliminate as much as 80% of someone’s previously acquired immunity to other pathogens! science.org/doi/full/10.11…