Test = vaccine

"Cheap, frequent COVID tests could be ‘akin to vaccine,’ professor says" from the Harvard Gazette HT Miles Kimball 

Yes, I'm repeating myself, but maybe if we just try over and over again we'll get through. We could stop this disease now with tests. Vaccines are just a tool to stop disease transmission. Widespread, cheap frequent tests are just as effective a tool to stop disease transmission. So I'll keep quoting anyone who wants to say this! 

A Harvard epidemiologist and expert in disease testing is calling for a shift in strategy toward a cheap, daily, do-it-yourself test that he says can be as effective as a vaccine at interrupting coronavirus transmission — and is currently the only viable option for a quick return to an approximation of normal life.

“These are our hope,” said Michal Mina, assistant professor of epidemiology at Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health and Brigham and Women’s Hospital. “We don’t have anything tomorrow, other than shutting down the economy and keeping schools closed.”

....the paper-strip tests have already been developed and their shotgun approach to testing — cheap and widespread — provides a way back to the workplace, classroom, and other venues.

The tests, which can be produced for less than a dollar, can be performed by consumers each day or every other day. Though not as accurate as current diagnostic tests, they are nonetheless effective at detecting virus when a person is most infectious, Mina said. If everyone who tests positive stays home, he said, the widespread effect would be similar to that of a vaccine, breaking transmission chains across the country.

... What I would like to see happen is to start using testing [as] a true public health tool to break transmission chains in the same way that we know we can use masks to decrease transmission,” Mina said. “I want these tests to tell people they’re transmitting [the virus to others] at the time they’re transmitting, and [when] people can act on it because they’re getting immediate results. And I want them to take it every single day, or every other day.”

Several companies have developed such tests, Mina said.

Why aren't we doing this, voluntarily even? 

The Food and Drug Administration,..  has held up approval because the tests aren’t as accurate as nasal-swab, lab-based tests. While that would matter if they were intended as an individual diagnostic tool, Mina said that from a public health viewpoint, they are accurate enough to provide critical initial screening on a large scale. ....

“Everyone says, ‘Why aren’t you doing this already?’ My answer is, ‘It is illegal to do this right now,’” Mina said. 

In other words, the FDA says:  "Yes, you can use a thermometer to screen people out and send them home. Yes, you can use a questionnaire to screen people out and send them home.  No, you may not use a far more accurate $1 paper test for exactly the same purpose. And if you try, we'll ruin your company and send you to jail." 

Alex Tabarrok puts it nicely: We're testing for contagiousness, not for infection. 

President Trump seems to have discovered President Obama's phone and pen. A suggestion: Tomorrow morning, 9 AM, executive order: The sale and use of these paper tests shall be legal. We could be done with Covid 19 in a month or two. 

from The Grumpy Economist https://ift.tt/30Vhd4l