Six COVID-19 positives in latest test batch

| 11/06/2020 | 77 Comments
Cayman News Service
HSA’s new GeneXpert machine for faster COVID-19 testing

(CNS): The steady increase in the number of positive samples for COVID-19 in Cayman continued Thursday, when officials reported six new cases from a batch of 556 test results completed since yesterday. All of these individuals are asymptomatic and were picked up as a result of the screening programme. Cayman has now recorded 186 positive cases after testing 16,628 people.

The latest results were revealed in a press release, in which Chief Medical Officer Dr John Lee said that contact tracing had started.

112 people have now recovered from the virus and there are 73 active cases. Just two of those people have symptoms and neither is in hospital. Meanwhile, 334 people are currently in government quarantine or in isolation at home.

Officials from the Health Service Authority have responded to CNS questions about the antibody testing, which is expected to start shortly. Explaining why those who have already tested positive with the current PCR test will be a priority group, officials said it was to see if the tests match up.

“It is important to see if there is concordance between PCR and antibody testing,” the HSA official said. “We know that some people do not mount an antibody reaction to infections in general, and probably also to COVID-19 disease, but we don’t know to what extent we will find this in Cayman.”

When it comes to other groups to be tested, Public Health said it is still in the process of finalising the sample groups, but in addition to health workers, those who are vulnerable because of existing medical conditions are the most likely to be prioritised. The initial target for testing, to give scientists a reasonable number to work with, would initially be between 5% and 8% of the population, officials added.


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Category: Health, Medical Health

Comments (77)

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  1. Anonymous says:

    For those shouting to reopen the economy, yes, it’s being done. However, those in the tourist industry are going to be screwed for a long time, at least until the US and UK fix their infection rates.

    The local, local economy is putting back on track in a sensible way, for the most part.

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  2. Anonymous says:

    The Cayman Islands Government has done an incredible job in handling the pandemic. The encouraging results is the result of the great work. Thank you Cayman Islands Government!

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    • Anonymous says:

      For all those who think this is much ado about nothing, meet your first symptomatic case in nearly two months and your first hospitalization.

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      • Anonymous says:

        I believe there were others in hospital at some point, but later released as they thankfully improved. But this Covid is no joke, we’re lucky here so far, but let’s not be complacent.

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  3. Anonymous says:

    Asymptomatic transmission of coronavirus appears to be worse than SARS or influenza — 5 reasons you should care

    https://www.marketwatch.com/story/asymptomatic-transmission-of-coronavirus-may-be-worse-than-sars-or-influenza-2020-06-12?siteid=yhoof2&yptr=yahoo

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  4. Anonymous says:

    We are still in lockdown because of the high risk people or we are in lockdown because we are taking directives from the Governor who is taking directive from the mother country. The decisions should not be a one size fit all but base on what is happening in the respective countries. The more we test the higher the positives will be but no one is getting sick. This should be the basis on which to decide to open or not to open. The people wanting the country to stay in lockdown are not and have not sacrificed a thing, so why should they care if the economy opens up. Fear is our biggest enemy. Cayman is a blessed country and if you believe this then fear shouldn’t have been a factor. Also all the residents of the country should be helped not just a chosen few.

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    • Say it like it is says:

      12.05pm So if you really think it’s the Governor and the Queen calling the shots here and not our Lord High Premier, you really have a problem.

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    • Anonymous says:

      Trust me, they’re not following UK. They pick, choose and modify the advice. Otherwise all non-contact workers would have been the first out, and by now you would be able to take more than 2 hours exercise, shop/bank on any day and at least be able to sit socially distant talking to relatives and neighbours in your own front yard.

  5. Anonymous says:

    My commute home is so long because of the queues of sick people trying to get into the 4 (yes, 4 now) hospitals during this horrendous pandemic sweeping across our Islands.

    Wait. Sorry, that was a movie that Dr Lee watched in January and told Alden and the 2 of them sh*t themselves. Which was fine for a while, though a little smelly.

    But now? There’s no pandemic here. Zero. Nada. None. But there is a growing educational, economic, mental health, and other pandemics waiting to explode.

    Stop this nonsense. Protect the vulnerable (frankly, they’ll protect themselves anyhow because they don’t want to get it) and let’s get going.

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    • Anonymous says:

      I feel sorry for you because you have COVID brain. Get well soon.

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    • Anonymous says:

      If everyone wore a mask being around people there would be no problems, but some people are to ignorant to do so. I myself seen employees from Waste Management no masks and closer than 2 feet apart. This is something government should enforce, then we can get on with it.

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      • Anonymous says:

        it’s pretty shocking how at this late date, people still don’t “get” it. Or they just don’t care.

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  6. Anonymous says:

    To all the doubting Covid experts on here. Can you explain how a 20 something year old Covid patient with no pre existing conditions needed a lung transplant? Is that fear mongering as you jackasses say?

    https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/health/2020/06/11/chicago-woman-gets-double-lung-transplant-after-coronavirus-damage/5341482002/

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    • Anonymous says:

      Yes I can.
      The same way a child dies from cancer or malaria or any other illnesses, it’s unfortunate but it happens.
      There is no doubt this has a much lower death rate than we where all lead to believe. In fact for everyone that is found in Cayman due to our superior testing number helps prove this.
      Our and others that test as much as us prove the rate is less than 0.5% if not 0.1%.

      So you stop your fear mongering!
      Numbers don’t lie Jackass!

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    • Anonymous says:

      Because there are anomalies to everything. There are some 7,000 rare diseases. Learn some statistics, populations and demographics.

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    • Anonymous says:

      It’s not that we doubt Covid. It’s very real. But we understand something called statistics. I’m sure it’s being taught online throughout our schools. Perhaps it’s time to enroll.

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      • Anonymous says:

        You all sound like them tooth missing hicks that have their tongues up Trump’s backside. Let me guess, this is all a government conspiracy to destroy the economy? I’ve heard it all. And to the moron recommending online statistics courses, that explains it. Keep perfecting your online degree. Hahaha

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        • Anonymous says:

          Are you a double masker or a triple masker?

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        • Anonymous says:

          I’m not American. I don’t watch Fox. I don’t have any conspiracy theories. I am curious about something though. Are you racist?

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          • Anonymous says:

            No. Just describing what I see on televised rallies. Those are the real racists. Thanks for asking.

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            • Anonymous says:

              You’ve twisted the context. You were accusing people here of it being like those people you see on tv. Don’t backtrack now!

              • Anonymous says:

                What’s your stupid self saying now? They do sound like those Trump ball hangers. You tried twisting it into racism. Having problems keeping up? You’re pathetic!

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              • Anonymous says:

                Are you still race-baiting?

          • Anonymous says:

            The only reason you hate Trump is because 5 out of 6 news agencies told you three and a half years of lies! And you still believe them!

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    • Anonymous says:

      It is ventilator machine damages lungs, not the virus. She was 2 months on a mechanical ventilator..

      Headlines for you to google.

      “Ventilators Cause Their Own Damage To Lungs. Is The Trauma Worth The Benefits For COVID-19 Patients?”

      Only a third of COVID-19 patients placed on a ventilator survive the experience, and doctors are starting to wonder if the life-saving machine should really be used in some cases.

      “Why Ventilators May Not Be Working as Well for COVID-19 Patients as Doctors Hoped”

      “Special Report: As virus advances, doctors rethink rush to ventilate” https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-ventilators-specia/special-report-as-virus-advances-doctors-rethink-rush-to-ventilate-idUSKCN2251PE

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    • Say it like it is says:

      10.28am Not and never in Cayman, but maybe a brain transplant for some.

  7. Anonymous says:

    2 more islands were added to the list of success stories yesterday when the Isle of Man and Guernsey opened their domestic economies after having no Covid cases for more than 30 days. They achieved that by high levels of testing, strict compliance with public health measures, and rapid contact tracing and isolation. Hopefully if we can increase our levels of PCR testing and expand our contact tracing we will be able to get to the same success.

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    • Anonymous says:

      Do you realize we are testing more than almost every country on the planet?

      Isle of Man testing per capita is 25% of our level while Guernsey is listed under the Channel Islands with Jersey on the Worldometer site. The rate for the Channel islands is even lower.

      There is a strong argument that we might actually be over testing by using PCR on people without symptoms. This will change once they start looking for antibodies but at the moment if we test people we will find positives but not necessarily real active cases. In recent months the positive results have overwhelmingly been asymptomatic which leads to the question if the tests are finding dead virus or churning out false positives.

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    • Anonymous says:

      meanwhile we have 30 in 8 days lol

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    • Anonymous says:

      We would also be on this same list if we didnt start testing people without symptoms – those islands didnt seek it out

  8. Anonymous says:

    Let’s see:
    Few more cases with every test batch – check.
    No one in the hospital – check.
    Just 2 people have symptoms – check.
    Economy still shut-down – check.
    Private sector jobs still being ruined – check.
    Govt employees still getting paid – check.
    Premier hopes we can open September unless things get worse – check.

    Let’s hope we don’t have 3 people in the hospital come Aug. 31.

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    • Anonymous says:

      Govt employees still doing their jobs and more.

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    • Anonymous says:

      I’m not a civil servant but I get why you’re upset the civil service is being paid still while many have no work, but some are still working. I just wish you would be happy that some people are still able to avoid financial ruin. You probably have taken a financial hit and I’m sorry for you about that, but why throw ill will towards others that are ok still. Many, if not most are helping as best they can.

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  9. Anonymous says:

    Why isn’t the community tested at random – like the shoppers?

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  10. Anonymous says:

    Another test, trace, and isolate success story from the BBC

    Two days after the UK entered lockdown, the Crown Dependency of Guernsey followed suit. The Channel Island has now seen no coronavirus cases for 42 days, a success public health authorities attribute to its test and trace programme.

    Guernsey’s 63,000 residents are able to go to the pub, get a haircut and meet up with friends and family. And on 20 June, the government will remove nearly all lockdown restrictions. So how did they manage it?

    Currently, everyone who enters a “controlled environment”, like a pub, restaurant or hairdressers, must leave their name and contact details – which are available at all times for the island’s Public Health Services to access.

    Dr Nicola Brink, Guernsey’s public health director, says she began recruitment for contact tracers in January. They have now spoken to 1,757 people, or just under 3% of the population.

    She says delays in tests carried out in the UK meant the island had to introduce a lockdown, but by the end of March Guernsey was carrying out its own tests for the equivalent of 160,000 people daily in UK terms.

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  11. Anonymous says:

    Repeat
    From the BBC – the Isle of Man is the latest island country to have beaten the virus and fully opened its domestic economy. We can do it too.
    The Isle of Man has become the first place in the British Isles to drop social distancing.

    Social distancing measures for the general public will be scrapped from Monday – but rules will remain in place for those working in health care and care homes for the elderly.

    Chief minister Howard Quayle said the decision had been taken to “get society back to normal”.

    Quayle described it as a “bold move”, but stressed the decision could be reversed should new cases of the virus emerge.

    Twenty-four people have died from coronavirus on the island, but there have been no new cases for 22 days.

    The island’s border will remain closed, pending a decision by the Council of Ministers at a later stage.

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  12. Anonymous says:

    Repeat
    Biggest study yet shows at least 44% of asymptomatic patients are infectious – from the Guardian

    Almost half of asymptomatic coronavirus carriers detected in Bahrain were found to pose a risk of spreading the virus to others, according to research by the country’s coronavirus task force.

    The research, which has not been peer-reviewed, could help to shed light on what has become a hot topic this week, after the World Health Organisation’s technical lead on Covid-19, Maria van Kherkove, suggested asymptomatic transmission was “very rare”.

    Kherkove later backtracked saying that there had been a misunderstanding over her comments.

    Bahrain’s data, shared with the Guardian on Thursday, is based on 367,764 tests, and is claimed to be the first based on real cases rather than models. It suggests that 44% of cases were still infectious despite not showing any symptoms.

    Asymptomatic cases were considered infectious if contact tracing of the original patient found other cases who had not been in contact with any other known cases.

    The finding comes after the WHO director general, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, called for more research on the extent to which the coronavirus could be spread by people who don’t show symptoms.

    “Since early February, we have said that asymptomatic people can transmit COVID-19, but that we need more research to establish the extent of asymptomatic transmission,” Tedros said on Tuesday.

    Bahrain, which is fifth in the world for testing rates, has recorded 16,667 cases. So far 11,487 patients have recovered, and 34 have died.

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  13. Anonymous says:

    🦠🦠🦠 AN UPDATE ON ANTIBODIES TESTING 🦠🦠🦠

    There are four types of antibodies that each have different functions: IgM, IgG, IgA, and IgE. Generally IgE are responsible for classical allergy symptoms, while IgA are particularly important for protecting the mucous membranes of the eyes, nose, mouth, and gastrointestinal tract. In the immune response to an infectious disease, IgM usually appear first, followed by IgG and IgA, with occasional contributions from IgE.

    Current antibody tests for COVID-19 test only IgM and IgG, and assume that IgM represents a recent infection, while IgG will represent a recent or distant infection.

    IgM comes first, followed by IgG. IgM disappears rather rapidly, while IgG stays elevated for a very long time. Therefore, IgM suggests recent infection whether IgG is present or not, while IgG alone suggests an infection in the more distant past.

    A preprint* released today by French researchers found things work completely differently❗️❗️❗️ in COVID-19:

    In the first week, there are nearly twice as many people who are positive for IgA to the spike protein than those who are positive for either of the other antibodies. IgA continues to be most prevalent in the second week, and it is almost as prevalent as IgG in the third and fourth weeks. IgM is never the most prevalent, and it drops off in the fifth week just like IgA. Only IgG remains prevalent in the fifth week.

    The pattern is similar for the antibodies to the protein coating, except IgA only dominates in the first week and has less of a lead on IgG.

    IgA antibodies were five times more effective than IgG antibodies at neutralizing SARS-CoV-2, the coronavirus that causes COVID-19.

    The patients whose IgA had the greatest ability to neutralize the virus were the ones who had the highest levels of IgA against the spike protein.

    That suggests that during the major period when the virus is being fought off, it is IgA antibodies against the spike protein that offer the most important defense in people who produce them effectively.

    🛑 This also suggests that the existing antibody tests are based on false assumptions. IgA, rather than IgM, should be used to indicate a recent infection. The authors suggest that we may even be able to use saliva samples to test for IgA against the virus, which would be especially useful for home testing.

    *Footnotes

    * The term “preprint” is often used in these updates. Preprints are studies destined for peer-reviewed journals that have yet to be peer-reviewed. Because COVID-19 is such a rapidly evolving disease and peer-review takes so long, most of the information circulating about the disease comes from preprints.

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  14. Anon says:

    My take away from these numbers is that the lockdown cannot control the spread of the China virus in the Cayman population. A little more than 1% will actively have the virus out of any group tested.

    The travel restriction might be effective. People are dying from the China virus strain circulating in the USA but largely asymptomatic from the strain in Cayman. Why the difference? It might just be that the average age is higher in the USA. The China virus doesn’t seem to affect young people as severely. Also, the stupid authorities in New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Michigan ordered nursing homes to take Covid 19 patients, so thousands died. In the USA a Democrat run health system (much like a Democrat run police Department) equals death.

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    • Anonymous says:

      Donald is that you? Stick to Twitter.

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      • Anonymous says:

        Donald, I just can’t take all this winning anymore. I am tired of winning. Can we start losing now? I am exhausted.

    • Anonymous says:

      Please call it the COVID-19 virus. It is a Global pandemic & no longer limited to China.

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      • Anonymous says:

        I would imagine the post is calling it the China virus because that is where it originated. In China.
        Is that not pc?? LOL

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        • Anonymous says:

          11:38 am: oh, what a sense of humor. Precious, you.

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        • Anonymous says:

          Shut up Trump fanboy.

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          • Anonymous says:

            You can call people anything you want! The issue here is not TRUMP. Radicals and emotional arguments are just divisive which is what anti Trump people want. They never discuss policy. Democrat policies do not work. they are feel good policies which do nothing for anyone except making Dems rich and we have 40 years of proof in the US!

        • Anonymous says:

          The PC people have me so confused I don’t know what to call Chinese food, Chinese medicine, Chinese people.

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        • Anonymous says:

          He’s calling it the China virus because he’s a racist.

    • Anonymous says:

      4:36 am: First, unsavory use of the term “China” virus is a clear give away that you need to change your news source.

      Cayman is not different from anywhere else, the uptick in positive cases means that a larger proportion of our population was infected than we surmised earlier. Luckily, the vulnerable segments of the population heeded advice and protected themselves. This information from US News and World Report, dated May 28, may help to lend some understanding of what is happening here:

      “Two studies published this week detail asymptomatic cases of the virus, with one finding that 81% of people who tested positive for COVID-19 on a cruise ship did not show symptoms. Passengers on the cruise ship, which left from Argentina in mid-March, were all screened for coronavirus symptoms before boarding for the planned 21-day Antarctic voyage.

      “The other found that 42% of a group of infected people in Wuhan, China, were asymptomatic. The patients were either exposed to someone who had the virus or a seafood market that some believe is the origin of the outbreak.

      “Taken together, the studies suggest that the number of people who have the virus without knowing it could be significant.

      “As countries progress out of lockdown, a high proportion of infected, but asymptomatic, individuals may mean that a much higher percentage of the population than expected may have been infected with COVID,” Alan Smyth, the joint editor-in-chief of the journal Thorax, where the cruise ship study was published, said in a statement.”

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      • Anonymous says:

        China sill hasn’t opened childcare or schools. That says something considering how ahead of us they are.

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    • Anonymous says:

      China virus? Wasn’t that an 80s pop group? Maybe I’m thinking of China Crisis but somebody sure is stuck in the past using terminology like that

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    • Anonymous says:

      The world is sick of racism, bigotry and prejudice, if you haven’t noticed. The virus could have originated anywhere, including the Cayman Dump, the perfect Petri dish for creating new viruses, bacterias, fungi, parasites….

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  15. Anonymous says:

    Each report a few more… 5 here,6 here,etc. People can make light of it, but it is worrisome for elders and those with vulnerable health issues or situations.

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    • Anonymous says:

      It is worrisome for no one

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    • Anonymous says:

      7:47 Glad to see someone else’s with sense. Completely agree, this certainly isn’t the time to be complacent.

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    • Anonymous says:

      if you understand statistics, you would not be worried

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      • Anonymous says:

        Share some of that expert knowledge, please

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        • Anonymous says:

          Many jurisdictions around the world are now testing people without symptoms as part of efforts to manage COVID-19. In Victoria, asymptomatic health-care workers have been part of the recent “testing blitz”.

          We tend to take for granted that the results of medical tests are accurate – but no test is perfect and all carry a risk of harm of some kind. Although there has been a drive to increase testing, we must recognise this is also true for coronavirus.

          All tests have limitations

          Among the shortfalls of diagnostic testing is the possibility of false negatives (failing to detect a condition when it’s present) and false positives (detecting a condition when it’s absent).

          It’s easy to see why false negatives can be a problem – we lose the benefits of early intervention.

          But false positives can also cause harm, including unnecessary treatment. This is why positive screening tests are often followed up with a second, different test to confirm a diagnosis.

          Examples include further imaging and possibly biopsy following a positive mammogram for breast cancer, or colonoscopy following positive screening for colon cancer.

          Why do we get false positives?

          False positives can occur for many reasons, including normal human and system errors (for example mislabelling, data entry errors or sample mishandling).

          Sometimes false positive test results could be due to a cross-reaction with something else in the sample, such as a different virus.

          For COVID-19, the only routinely available option to confirm a positive result is to retest using the same method. This can address the false positives generated through sample contamination or human error.

          Even so, some authorities recommend isolation for any person who returns a positive test, regardless of subsequent results.

          Testing more widely could mean more false positives

          The proportion of false positives among all positive results depends not just on the characteristics of the test, but on how common the condition being tested for is among those being tested.

          This is because even a highly specific test – one that generates hardly any false positives – may still generate more false positive results than there are actual cases of the condition in those being tested (true positives).

          Let’s work through an example.

          Say we have a very good test which is 99.9% specific – that is, only one in 1,000 tests give a false positive. And imagine we’re testing 20,000 people for condition X. Condition X has a very low prevalence – we estimate it affects 0.01%, or one in 10,000 people in the population.

          At this level we could expect two people in our sample to have condition X, so we might get two true positive results. But we would also expect around 20 false positive results, given the error rate of our test.

          So the proportion of people testing positive who actually have condition X would be only two out of 22, or 9.1%.

          This is called the positive predictive value of a test. The lower the prevalence of a condition in the population, the lower the positive predictive value.

          What about COVID-19?

          In Australia, control measures have been very successful in reducing the number of people currently infected with COVID-19. We estimate the likelihood of a positive test to be very low right now (although of course this may change as restrictions ease).

          The current reported number of active COVID-19 cases in Australia is about 600. And even if we’ve only diagnosed one in every ten people currently infected, this still represents less than 0.03% of the population.

          While we’re still establishing the specificity of tests for SARS-CoV-2 (the coronavirus that causes COVID-19), early evidence suggests an estimate of 99% or greater is reasonable.

          However, following the same calculations as in the example above, at a prevalence of 0.03%, even a test with 99.9% specificity would mean only 30% of people who test positive actually have the condition. This means more than two-thirds of positive results would actually be false positives if we were testing asymptomatic people with no increased risk.

          This is why testing criteria are often applied. If testing is offered only to those with symptoms consistent with COVID-19, the condition is almost certainly more common in those being tested than in the general (asymptomatic) population, and therefore the rate of true positives is going to be higher.

          But if we start testing more broadly, the likelihood of false positives becomes a greater concern.

          Why are false positives a problem?

          Clearly we need tests to be as sensitive as possible – it’s easy to see why a false negative COVID-19 result could be a serious issue. But it’s important to recognise a false positive result can also cause significant problems for an individual and the community.

          Consider, for example, the impact of asymptomatic health worker screening if a false positive test result leads to isolation of the person falsely diagnosed, and quarantining of their clinical co-workers identified (incorrectly) as close contacts of a case of COVID-19.

          Further, a person who has had a false positive result may feel they are not at risk of future infection as they believe they are immune, leading to potential consequences for the individual and their contacts.

          Even from an epidemiologicial perspective, a high proportion of false positives could distort our understanding of the spread of COVID-19 in the community.

          Testing for COVID-19 in Australia is highly regulated and uses the best possible tests and highly qualified staff.

          But asymptomatic screening when the prevalence of a condition is as low as that of COVID-19 in Australia currently must carefully weigh the benefits of such testing against the potential harms.

      • Anonymous says:

        Just look at the stats for Florida, Texas and Arizona today. Damn scary.

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      • Anonymous says:

        Understand stats and am feeling better in “our” special situation. However, I’m also fully aware that there’s ALOT we don’t know about this virus, so would hate to waste the months we’ve sacrificed to contain this virus and throw it out the window, when we are SO CLOSE to having a relatively normal life we can enjoy again before our borders open up and potentially get shut down again.

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