Rachel 98 said:

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Does anyone know if hospitals are having a shortage of surgical masks? I know they aren't protective like the N95s are, but I thought they could potentially be useful to have infected patients wear. I work at a veterinary hospital and we have several unopened boxes.

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Hey Rachel, I recieved this email earlier from one of my associations. I know its geared toward the construction industry, but it talks about supplies needed and where you can drop them off. I apologize for the poor quality, but this was the fastest way to spread the information.

Consumer Lab.com is a great resource in researching supplements.

Kool said:

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I was just on a CMS/FDA teleconference for providers. The FDA just approved of a self-administered nasal (not nasopharyngeal) swab for Covid-19. It will be interesting to see how this gets marketed, and to whom, and what precautions will be taken for delivery and transport of this test. I am not exactly thrilled about it.

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My understanding is the great benefit to this test is someone can self-administer and therefore no PPE has to be used by the person giving the test. That seems like a huge benefit. Why are you not thrilled? This is ah honest question, I'm not a medical professional but just want to understand.

Tailgate88 said:

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Kool said:

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I was just on a CMS/FDA teleconference for providers. The FDA just approved of a self-administered nasal (not nasopharyngeal) swab for Covid-19. It will be interesting to see how this gets marketed, and to whom, and what precautions will be taken for delivery and transport of this test. I am not exactly thrilled about it.

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My understanding is the great benefit to this test is someone can self-administer and therefore no PPE has to be used by the person giving the test. That seems like a huge benefit. Why are you not thrilled? This is ah honest question, I'm not a medical professional but just want to understand.

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I think his concerns were in his post - "what precautions will be taken for delivery and transport of this test"

Concerned about the handling of materials used for the test and how the test results are transported. Currently, I believe tests are administered by those trained in the medical field and so they are better at handling and disposing of the items used in the test.

Complete Idiot said:

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Tailgate88 said:

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Kool said:

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I was just on a CMS/FDA teleconference for providers. The FDA just approved of a self-administered nasal (not nasopharyngeal) swab for Covid-19. It will be interesting to see how this gets marketed, and to whom, and what precautions will be taken for delivery and transport of this test. I am not exactly thrilled about it.

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My understanding is the great benefit to this test is someone can self-administer and therefore no PPE has to be used by the person giving the test. That seems like a huge benefit. Why are you not thrilled? This is ah honest question, I'm not a medical professional but just want to understand.

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I think his concerns were in his post - "what precautions will be taken for delivery and transport of this test"

Concerned about the handling of materials used for the test and how the test results are transported. Currently, I believe tests are administered by those trained in the medical field and so they are better at handling and disposing of the items used in the test.

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Yup. One concern will be over-testing. Another concern would be false negatives. The virus seems to be highly concentrated within the nasopharynx. That is not an easy site to access. Back in the old days, before Covid-19, I used to scope tons of people every day. Accessing the nasopharynx is not always very easy. And it certainly isn't comfortable. Even when I would spray Afrin followed by lidocaine into their noses (definitely verboten now). Putting a swab into your nose is very noxious. The natural reflex will be to pull away. So, overutilization, false negatives, and, of course, transport and processing of contaminated specimens are all of concerns to me. I am not saying that the kits should not be allowed, just that there are some concerns I would have.

My understanding is that these will be used at the drive up test centers. Patient is handed test, opens swabs puts into the container and hands back to the person at the drive through. Purpose is to reduce the amount of PPE required at test centers so it can be used in hospitals, clinics etc....this was according to the town hall with Pres Trump

alittleright said:

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My understanding is that these will be used at the drive up test centers. Patient is handed test, opens swabs puts into the container and hands back to the person at the drive through. Purpose is to reduce the amount of PPE required at test centers so it can be used in hospitals, clinics etc....this was according to the town hall with Pres Trump

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Gotcha, thanks. That helps alleviate one concern. The webinar today said it was based on about 600 patients, and that the correlation between nasopharyngeal swabs and these self administered swabs was good. I just hope people don't have a lot of false negatives and consider themselves free of disease and let down their guard. It was very interesting that there was a very poor correlation between the oral swabs and nasopharyngeal swabs, again per the webinar. Everything in the nasopharynx is eventually pushed into the nasal cavity via cilia and normal mucosal clearing, so it seems odd that a properly performed oral swab would correlate so poorly. Perhaps people were swabbing the tongue and not really getting to the posterior pharyngeal wall, for fear of eliciting a gag reflex and because of patients' anatomy. Still waiting on my test kits from LabCorp and from Quest. At this point, as I am almost exclusively doing telemedicine, it's probably just as well.

Apologies if this has already been addressed, but do we have any concrete assurances from the medical community that people who have fully recovered from Covid-19 are (or are not) susceptible to contracting the illness again, be it the same virus or a known strain of the virus? There seems to be a lot of conflicting information floating around about this. Thank you.

Thank you Taco! We are meeting tomorrow to discuss all of this and this sounds like a very convenient way to get the help to those who need it.

DifferenceMaker Ag said:

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Apologies if this has already been addressed, but do we have any concrete assurances from the medical community that people who have fully recovered from Covid-19 are (or are not) susceptible to contracting the illness again, be it the same virus or a known strain of the virus? There seems to be a lot of conflicting information floating around about this. Thank you.

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Check out this thread regarding your inquiry...

Herd Immunity

Gary79Ag said:

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DifferenceMaker Ag said:

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Apologies if this has already been addressed, but do we have any concrete assurances from the medical community that people who have fully recovered from Covid-19 are (or are not) susceptible to contracting the illness again, be it the same virus or a known strain of the virus? There seems to be a lot of conflicting information floating around about this. Thank you.

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Check out this thread regarding your inquiry...

Herd Immunity

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Thanks.

So basically, no one with credibility can answer this question definitively yet, especially since most of the existing examples stem from a woefully corrupt and unreliable source; China. Although there was one (1) case in Japan, as well as one (1) case in S. Korea, that seemed to indicate a confirmed positive for reinfection, even those instances seemed open to anecdotal evidence, ie. false negative tests results that were misinterpreted as "cured" and later "reinfected."

Furthermore, the vast majority of "doctors" throughout China are laughably untrained in actual medicine by our standards, and I simply don't trust or believe anything that the CCP reports to the world regarding their track record with COVID. Sorry, That's just my personal observation, but it's based on a lot of personal knowledge and experience with that part of the world. Maybe that's just me, but I am okay with that.

I suppose I'll just wait and see how this plays out within a medical community that has actually attended accredited medical schools, and follows western medicine philosophies. For now, I'll just assume that if you fully recover from COVID, you will carry with you the antibodies to fight off reinfection for a still unknown (controversial) period of time, as those antibodies are apparently perishable within your immune system.

Still hoping for a better answer though.

nm.. Not worth answering.

Kool said:

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alittleright said:

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My understanding is that these will be used at the drive up test centers. Patient is handed test, opens swabs puts into the container and hands back to the person at the drive through. Purpose is to reduce the amount of PPE required at test centers so it can be used in hospitals, clinics etc....this was according to the town hall with Pres Trump

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Gotcha, thanks. That helps alleviate one concern. The webinar today said it was based on about 600 patients, and that the correlation between nasopharyngeal swabs and these self administered swabs was good. I just hope people don't have a lot of false negatives and consider themselves free of disease and let down their guard. It was very interesting that there was a very poor correlation between the oral swabs and nasopharyngeal swabs, again per the webinar. Everything in the nasopharynx is eventually pushed into the nasal cavity via cilia and normal mucosal clearing, so it seems odd that a properly performed oral swab would correlate so poorly. Perhaps people were swabbing the tongue and not really getting to the posterior pharyngeal wall, for fear of eliciting a gag reflex and because of patients' anatomy. Still waiting on my test kits from LabCorp and from Quest. At this point, as I am almost exclusively doing telemedicine, it's probably just as well.

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The false negative is my concern with all the worried well. Someone who is concerned about being exposed recently could run down to the test center to get a test. If it is too early for a good viral load to develop, they may test negative and think they are fine and then end up spreading the virus.

Also my concern with other tests. Because of the amplification, RT-PCR can get good detection with a smaller load than an immunoassay that detects the virus.

Even worse, a test for IgM and IgG would have to wait for the body to develop antibodies to the virus. It's fine if you are showing symptoms 5-7 after infection, but a day or two post exposure could give a false negative and have people out and about again instead of following a 14 day self isolation.

DifferenceMaker Ag said:

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Gary79Ag said:

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DifferenceMaker Ag said:

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Apologies if this has already been addressed, but do we have any concrete assurances from the medical community that people who have fully recovered from Covid-19 are (or are not) susceptible to contracting the illness again, be it the same virus or a known strain of the virus? There seems to be a lot of conflicting information floating around about this. Thank you.

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Check out this thread regarding your inquiry...

Herd Immunity

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Thanks.

So basically, no one with credibility can answer this question definitively yet, especially since most of the existing examples stem from a woefully corrupt and unreliable source; China. Although there was one (1) case in Japan, as well as one (1) case in S. Korea, that seemed to indicate a confirmed positive for reinfection, even those instances seemed open to anecdotal evidence, ie. false negative tests results that were misinterpreted as "cured" and later "reinfected."

Furthermore, the vast majority of "doctors" throughout China are laughably untrained in actual medicine by our standards, and I simply don't trust or believe anything that the CCP reports to the world regarding their track record with COVID. Sorry, That's just my personal observation, but it's based on a lot of personal knowledge and experience with that part of the world. Maybe that's just me, but I am okay with that.

I suppose I'll just wait and see how this plays out within a medical community that has actually attended accredited medical schools, and follows western medicine philosophies. For now, I'll just assume that if you fully recover from COVID, you will carry with you the antibodies to fight off reinfection for a still unknown (controversial) period of time, as those antibodies are apparently perishable within your immune system.

Still hoping for a better answer though.

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There was the monkey test that indicates immunity to reinfection. Not sure which country that is from, and it is monkeys not people, but it is promising.

Here's another twist since I don't recall this particular scenario being posed. My brother is a good Samaritan and always taking people in to try and help. He is 70+, two heart attacks with only 60% heart function, smoked for 40 years (funny how nearly dying broke his smoking habit) and sedentary. He has two other, younger adults living with him, and one has a child. They both moved out, temporarily, for fear of infecting him. He is concerned about one of them having CV, recovering and still infecting him (other than community spread). If you recover from CV, is all the virus killed off in your body?

tmaggie50 said:

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Can the virus survive in a freezer? Wondering if I have to waste Lysol on products that are going to be in the freezer for at least 12-24 hours before I use them

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What product is it?

Freezing will kill it but it may damage the product. I have a N95 mask that I am leaving in sunlight to disinfect, because that is the least harmful disinfectant to the integrity of the mask.

Bobcat06 said:

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tmaggie50 said:

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Can the virus survive in a freezer? Wondering if I have to waste Lysol on products that are going to be in the freezer for at least 12-24 hours before I use them

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What product is it?

Freezing will kill it but it may damage the product. I have a N95 mask that I am leaving in sunlight to disinfect, because that is the least harmful disinfectant to the integrity of the mask.

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Just food delivered from grocery store. Just curious if it'll die off so I can save the sanitizing.

I guess same question for regular refrigeration?

Looks like kitchen oven for 30 min set to 70 degree C / 158F is the best approach to sterilize and reuse the N95.

https://www.covid19ether.com/blog/c/0/i/43928911/n95-mask-can-be-decontaminated-without-decreasing-filtration-efficiency

Hey Doc,

I don't know how effective these would be but maybe an alternative to the medical masks could be those fishing face covers?

Outdoor stores carry them and I'd like to think they're better than nothing so just a thought!

ttuhscaggie said:

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Looks like kitchen oven for 30 min set to 70 degree C / 158F is the best approach to sterilize and reuse the N95.

https://www.covid19ether.com/blog/c/0/i/43928911/n95-mask-can-be-decontaminated-without-decreasing-filtration-efficiency

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Nice! Thanks!