3 ms·
Similar story here, had COVID-19-like symptoms in mid-March, but the Abbott test (administered at CityMD) came back negative. It makes me wonder what exactly i
by CydeWeys 7y ago
Similar story here, had COVID-19-like symptoms in mid-March, but the Abbott test (administered at CityMD) came back negative.
It makes me wonder what exactly is going on with this test. Do some people not produce antibodies? Is it overly specific to one strain of the virus and other people in NYC got a different strain that doesn't produce compatible antibodies? Was there some non-COVID-19 respiratory infection that hit NYC at around that same time that went under the radar? Is this test somehow just not as good as we think it is?
- Marsymars 7y ago> Was there some non-COVID-19 respiratory infection that hit NYC at around that same time that went under the radar? Not really under the radar, there are always a lot of respiratory illnesses. In my area, after reducing non-covid cold/flu by an order of magnitude due to social distancing, we're testing everyone with cold/flu symptoms, and they're still ~96.5% not covid-19.
- CydeWeys 7y agoYeah, but I'm in NYC. Since some inflection point in March the vast majority of patients presenting with these symptoms do in fact have COVID-19. Being the global epicenter of the pandemic will do that :/
- Marsymars 7y agoSlim majority, not vast - NYC test positivity rate peaked at around 55% IIRC.
- CydeWeys 7y agoA lot of those tests were people not presenting with COVID-19 symptoms though. Think of all the asymptomatic people who were getting tested; that group had a much lower test positivity rate than 55%, thus bringing the average down. For people who had all the right symptoms, it was higher than 55%.
- Marsymars 7y agoThat effect doesn't seem like it would skew a larger difference between Alberta and NYC test positivity rates. If anything, that would depress Alberta test positivity rates more than NYC ones, since we've got more spare testing capacity for people without all the right symptoms.