Thread by @malolisica

Dear Premier, @fordnation:

A word.

It’s about the tests.

We need them back.

#BringBacktheTests
#PCRsMatter
#FreethePCRs
#BringBacktheTests
#PCRsMatter
#FreethePCRs
#BringBacktheTests
#PCRsMatter
#FreethePCRs

Is the ON testing strategy working for the people?
As a citizen & taxpayer, I have certain expectations of public health & universal health care.

I want to know:
1.Whether I’m sick with a disabling, deadly virus (or contagious);
2.I can get timely effective treatment if sick;

3.There is a safety net if I become disabled; and,
4.That the government has a handle on the volume of cases so it can respond accordingly.

At the moment, I’m very concerned that govt & public health are unable to deliver.

Here’s why. A 🧵.

How to know if you have Covid19?
Options:
1. Go by symptoms (new ones emerging/more dominant with each variant)
2. Use a rapid test to screen (imperfect), or
3. Get a PCR (gold standard but basically non-existent).

I have a fondness for #RATs (not rats 🐭🐭🐭); I fought to #FreeTheRats. That said, there are challenges that need to be addressed. Read this after in FULL by @BenMazer .
theatlantic.com/health/archive…

The RATs were intended as a screening & surveillance tool; not a diagnostic one. Read this thread from @lisa_iannattone twitter.com/lisa_iannattone which outlines a proposal to limit the damage during the 6th wave (because #CovidIsNotOver and it’s here).

Here’s our own @COVIDSciOntario table brief on the sensitivity of rapid antigen tests.
covid19-sciencetable.ca/sciencebrief/u…

The symptoms may be shifting with new variants, and while we’ve been focusing on sore throats & runny noses from this "mild cold," Covid may have other plans, such as abdominal ones. Are the tests picking up #BA2? H/t @LauraMiers

https://twitter.com/LauraMiers/status/1507082641157279752?s=20&t=SPBPjf7ireDj_zavGI8qWA

Does how you test matter? YES!
Does the public know? NO!
There are various techniques to increase the sensitivity of the rapid tests. Check this out from @imgrund. Shouldn't public health be telling us this?

https://twitter.com/imgrund/status/1506424059206246401?s=20&t=SPBPjf7ireDj_zavGI8qWA

Another real worry is that thousands will take a rapid test, get one or two negatives, think they only have a cold or just run down, and then they go on to spread Covid to others MASKLESS.
It's happening. It's probably happened to someone you know.

We have the capacity to dramatically and the unused funds. T/Y @RevivalCare

https://twitter.com/RevivalCare/status/1508590413065695233?s=20&t=2Zwj18TTnEjSNrNLgHHORA

So, why no tests?

No tests; no Covid.
No tests; no return to “normal.”

🙈🙉🙊

Testing matters, if you want to get treatment. Didn't an amazing antiviral get approved?

Without a timely, accurate diagnosis, you can't get Paxlovid, Fluvoxamine, or Monoclonal Antibodies.

What about this proposal from H/t @mustafahirji

https://twitter.com/mustafahirji/status/1508527305370578950?s=20&t=2Zwj18TTnEjSNrNLgHHORA

Let's talk #LongCovid.
There are huge implications if Ontarians (and Canadians) are mass infected, thinking it’s mild, and then ending up with long covid, attempting to navigate our siloed health system not built for a multisystem disease.

It might mean seeing specialist after specialist, taking test after test to rule out other diagnoses – or worse, you could be told it's psychosomatic. ⛽️🕯️

And yet, getting mild covid can mean a complete transformation in the quality of your life. cp24.com/news/complete-…

Going maskless and catching this "mild" cold is actually playing roulette with your entire future. You don't want the wheel to land on #LongCovid.

“Conservative estimates currently peg the number of Canadians with long COVID at 300,000, Cheung says."
cbc.ca/news/canada/ed…

“From the way political leaders in many high-income nations are talking and acting, it would be easy to think that the COVID-19 pandemic is no longer worth keeping track of. The pandemic might have taken upwards of 18 million lives, disabled many more than that

and gut-punched the global economy, yet surveillance and reporting of the virus’s movements are starting to slow just at a time when a highly infectious subvariant of Omicron, BA.2, is spilling out across the world and case rates and hospitalizations are creeping back up.”

This is no time to stop tracking and testing and surveilling the virus.

nature.com/articles/d4158…

Learning to live with Covid – and not preventing it – will create a rapidly-growing underclass. Read this from @SustainableSong

https://twitter.com/SustainableSong/status/1505958806219595780?s=20&t=SPBPjf7ireDj_zavGI8qWA

Will you be able to work if you get long covid? Do you have months or years' worth of savings? Do you have sick pay or disability coverage?
Because, lastly, there’s the whole issue of proof. Insurers are, after all, for-profit businesses.

Why would they approve an extremely costly disability claim without sufficient evidence? They won’t. And they aren’t. Time will tell what government disability plans will require.

See my previous thread on PCRs, long covid, and disability coverage.

https://twitter.com/malolisica/status/1503193266371674116?s=20&t=SPBPjf7ireDj_zavGI8qWA

Bottom line: We need access to diagnostic PCRs, better information about rapid tests – when & how to use them, & more focus on preventing the spread of this not-mild disease so that more life-long harm can be prevented. We need public health & govt to #protectnotinfect.

We cannot go back to “normal”, & we should not normalize illness, death, and disability.

It’s time.
We have the capacity.
You have the reasons.
You need the will. Please find it. Before many, many more lose everything they hold dear.
Make integrity and goodness the new normal.