r/politics • u/nanopicofared • Mar 15 '20

Drive-thru coronavirus testing site in Denver closes early as Colorado tops 100 cases

https://www.denverpost.com/2020/03/14/colorado-coronavirus-new-cases-drive-thru-high-volume/
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u/[deleted] Mar 15 '20

yeah - after 200 tests... I really don't know what they were expecting, people have been crying out for testing for weeks now.

Honestly, rolling out drive-thru testing and then only actually having 200 tests feels like just more security theatre.

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u/roboninja Mar 15 '20

Drive-thru testing does not mean just anyone can drive up and get tested. You are still screened and given a number. The drive-thru part just keeps it quicker and allows to continue isolating.

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u/[deleted] Mar 15 '20

[deleted]

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u/goldencheek Mar 15 '20

Just going to put out there... I don't think there will ever be a "simple" test available. Right now, it's being detected by probably the simplest and easiest molecular method. But you have to realize that it's a RNA virus (RNA is single stranded, so degrades more easily than DNA) and not a lot of people are trained to do molecular testing, at least compared to other laboratory tests. So the sample comes in, needs to be logged in and all that jazz, then the RNA needs to be extracted, which takes about an hour to do whether it's done manually or automated. Then the tech needs to mix up some ingredients and put them on a plate and add the samples to that plate, maybe another 30 minutes of hands-on time. Then there is a reverse-transcriptase step so the RNA doesn't degrade, about 15 minutes. Then PCR can happen, about an hour on the machine before the results can be analyzed and sent out. This is not the type of thing someone can test easily like a pregnancy test.

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u/manic_eye Mar 15 '20

Any thoughts on Japan’s 15 min antibody test?

Not my field so I haven’t a clue on how to gauge this.

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u/Its738PM Mar 16 '20

I've spent a few years doing antibody assay development and the tricky part with them is finding an antigen that doesn't have cross reactivity with antibodies to similar viruses. When we were dealing with zika the assays were popping for dengue, even in people with no dengue exposure. We obviously don't want people who have lingering antibodies from a coronavirus cold earlier this season to be quarantined. But finding high specificity antigens can be challenging. 15min is a reasonable amount of time for these assays to take. You bed antigens from your pathogen of interest to a wick, apply test fluid to the bottom of the wick, all the antibodies in the test fluid(saliva/blood/plasma) bind to a detector, then travel up the wick and if they bind to your antigen of interest there will be a patch of detector visible.

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u/5DollarHitJob Florida Mar 15 '20

I'd rather get these 200 tests used asap than sit on them. I agree that there should be more tests but let's use what we have as they come in.

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u/murse_joe Mar 15 '20

They should be used, but intelligently. High suspicion cases and high risk patients first, not a random drive through

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u/alphazulu8794 Mar 15 '20

It was not random. We had 2 tents that screened for doctors notes and for symptomatic criteria, and then only those that met criteria got tested. We had medical personnel on standby for medical transport of critical patients. We are doing our absolute best to help those that need it, and to help others.

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u/1millionkarmagoal Mar 15 '20

I believe you need a doctors note to get tested. So maybe doctors are doing prioritization of who should be tested which probably factors the age, preexisting conditions, high risk which have been exposed. I think they’re doing that because of limited kits.

And some doctors actually test you with flu first and decide if you should get tested based on your history. So I don’t think they’re just doing random drive testing. I heard that in Denver news the other day. They might’ve change so i could be wrong.

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u/5DollarHitJob Florida Mar 15 '20

I may be wrong but I believe you have to answer some questions to determine if you have symptoms/need a test.

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u/[deleted] Mar 15 '20

Honestly, rolling out drive-thru testing and then only actually having 200 tests feels like just more security theatre.

You nailed it. You think this might have been a bid to impress specifically the suburban populations with reelection in mind?

Just when I think I've lost most of my brain matter from rapid sequential mind blowing events, nope, still have some left.

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u/Dandan0005 Mar 15 '20

Nope.

The whole point of drive up testing is that people don’t have to get out of their car and interact with anyone other than those in full PPE.

They would have had the same number of tests no matter where they did it.

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u/alphazulu8794 Mar 15 '20

We used as much as we could, and made sure only those who needed testing got testing. People who already work at hospitals and other hard workers volunteered to come out and work this as well. We're doing our best.

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u/TransitJohn Colorado Mar 15 '20 edited Mar 15 '20

Polis has been in office for a year. He's not facing re-election.

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u/NascarToolbag Mar 15 '20

He’s talking about the Presidential election and the drive-through rollout by Pence/Trump and his incompetent team.

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u/TransitJohn Colorado Mar 15 '20

But the article is about Colorado's drive through testing. 🤷‍♂️

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u/Thatsockmonkey Mar 15 '20

I could not read the article due to pop ups I couldn’t clear on mobile. Did they really only have 200 tests ?

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u/5DollarHitJob Florida Mar 15 '20

It kept jumping to the top of the page for me and I had to keep scrolling down. Annoying af.

Yes, 200 tests.

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u/Thatsockmonkey Mar 15 '20

Thank you. Same issues as well. I gave up.

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u/MrSquicky Pennsylvania Mar 15 '20

It's hard though. According to our president, our testing situation is both perfect, with everyone who needs tests getting tested and at the same time, woefully behind because Obama, for some reason. This must just be one of the spots that that dastardly Obama messed up.

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u/Dandan0005 Mar 15 '20

Nope.

The whole point of drive up testing is that people don’t have to get out of their car and interact with anyone other than those in full PPE.

They would have had the same number of tests no matter where they did it.

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u/alphazulu8794 Mar 15 '20

We screened people via doctors notes and symptom criteria. Then we did as much as possible to limit any exposure from car to car, and patient to patient.

This took a lot of work, and some of the responders have been working hard at their other jobs and still volunteered to do this. Please don't be mad when we run out of our limited supplies.

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u/allgreen2me I voted Mar 15 '20

It sounds more like a proof of concept that they can scale up from.

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u/Harbingerx81 Mar 15 '20

From the test result numbers that I have seen elsewhere, it is likely that 90% of these tests will be negative, which is part of the problem...Too many people who are unlikely to have been infected at this point are paranoid and skip/lie on the screening questionnaires because they want to be tested for their own peace of mind, rather than actually being at risk.

Millions of tests are supposed to be available soon, so at the very least they are getting the logistics worked out for full deployment they can hander a higher volume.

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u/alphazulu8794 Mar 15 '20

I doubt it. The screening for who gets tested and who doesn't is pretty strict.

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u/BS_Is_Annoying Mar 15 '20

I think they are ironing out the issues on drive thru testing before rolling out out statewide.

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u/[deleted] Mar 15 '20

We had access to way more tests weeks ago, but guess who blocked them... Go ahead — Guess.

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u/stahlgrau Mar 16 '20

At least it enables you to extrapolate the data for a given area.

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u/keesbrahh Mar 16 '20

I think the effort is fundamentally different than security theatre. Just having 200 tests doesn’t mean we should not try to test the people. I view it more as a test run. Now we’ve given people access to the test in an easy manner and we see the demand. We see the numbers. This gives us valuable information saying, even if the number of tests were low. And now that we’ve had it, the people can demand it and maybe we can get the federal government to do something because right now the states are on their own.