Coronavirus testing in Texas plummets as schools prepare to reopen

[TomCADem]

Source: Texas Tribune

The number of Texans being tested for the coronavirus has fallen sharply in recent weeks, a trend that has worried public health experts as officials consider sending children back to school while thousands more Texans are infected each day.

In the week ending Aug. 8, an average 36,255 coronavirus tests were administered in Texas each day — a drop of about 42% from two weeks earlier, when the average number of daily tests was 62,516.

At the same time, the percentage of tests yielding positive results has climbed, up to 20% on average in the week ending Aug. 8. Two weeks earlier, the average positivity rate was around 14%.

On Saturday, the state set a record for its positivity rate, with more than half of that day’s roughly 14,000 viral tests indicating an infection. Taken together, the low number of tests and the large percentage of positive results suggest inadequacies in the state's public health surveillance effort at a time when school reopenings are certain to increase viral spread, health experts said.

Read more: https://www.texastribune.org/2020/08/10/coronavirus-testing-texas/

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Is it premature to start celebrating the number of COVID-19 cases? Afterall, as Trump will say, if you test, you will find cases, so you have Florida and Texas moving to slow down testing.

Voila! Problem solved!

[groundloop]

1. The drop in testing is largely due to people not seeking to be tested

The decline in tests may be driven in at least some places by a drop in demand. In Austin, health officials say fewer people are seeking tests through the city’s online portal and at local events. Local officials had been forced in late June to limit testing only to people who were showing symptoms of the coronavirus. Now, they are opening it back up to asymptomatic people.

[TomCADem]

2. Isn't the drop in demand due to limited tests?

"Local officials had been forced in late June to limit testing only to people who were showing symptoms of the coronavirus."

It is one thing of demand just dropped on its own, but if demand dropped because people were discouraged from waiting in long lines, then I do not think that is a good thing.

[herding cats]

5. Exactly.

This is working as planned down here.

[herding cats]

3. True. Which is in part due to to wait times in line and ludicrously slow results.

Why bother if you wait hours to be tested in line and then days (5-7) for your results? Suck it up and just wait until you feel better, or not, and trudge on.

Now, mostly the truly sick are being tested by their healthcare providers. This isn't how you stop a pandemic.

[stillcool]

4. I wonder why...they don't seem to know..

On Saturday, the state set a record for its positivity rate, with more than half of that day’s roughly 14,000 viral tests indicating an infection.

Taken together, the low number of tests and the large percentage of positive results suggest inadequacies in the state's public health surveillance effort at a time when school reopenings are certain to increase viral spread, health experts said.

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And at sites in Dallas, testing numbers have been declining over the past few weeks as locals utilize less of the city’s capacity.

The number of tests performed in Texas has “never been great,” said Vivian Ho, a health economist at Rice University and Baylor College of Medicine, but “it’s extremely troubling” that the numbers have dipped since last month.

“It’s troubling because we can guess at some of the reasons, but we’re not sure,” she said.

https://www.texastribune.org/2020/08/10/coronavirus-testing-texas/

[LogicFirst]

7. Arizona says cases are down.

But . . . testing is down because the test sites are in the outlying areas. If testing were done in the highly populated areas, cases would be up. I do know one person who got a private test with a 24 hour result: $75.00.

[patphil]

6. You won't find what you don't look for.

The people of Texas deserve better treatment than they are getting from Governor Abbott.

Failure to test will allow infected people to unwittingly carry the infection out to other people. It will ultimately result in a rapid increase in the rate of infection, number of people hospitalized, and number of people who die from the disease.

A lack of testing doesn't reduce the danger, it does just the opposite.
Of course, they also have to get the turn-around time on the test results down to no more than 24 hours.

This is a disgrace, not just for Texas, but for all the other states that are following this model.

It's premeditated, criminally negligent homicide.