( Washington, 4th August 2020 ) Regular testing to find out if they are infected with COVID-19 may reverse the battle against COVID-19! The Harvard professor of the United States recently called for the use of relatively low-accuracy but inexpensive and time-saving rapid detection tools to test more people in order to curb the continued spread of the epidemic.
Coronary disease carriers often have a strong ability to spread, and the ability to infect the virus is strongest a few days before symptoms appear. Home-testing once or twice a week may allow people to self-test before going to work, school, flying, attending parties, or visiting the elderly, so that subjects can know whether they are infected in time and ensure self-isolation to avoid infecting others.
Mina, assistant professor of epidemiology at Harvard University, said that the high-precision molecular test currently used in the United States, the PCR coronavirus screening test, is still scarce in most parts of the country, and people often spend hours waiting for completion. It will take days or even a week to know the results. He believes that PCR testing should be abandoned and urged the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to authorize the sale of rapid test paper that can be used at home.
A quick test paper, similar to a pregnancy test, will change color within 15 minutes to get a result. He pointed out that the rapid test paper is less sensitive, but Mina and many other experts believe that from a public health point of view, adopting this strategy will be more efficient, because the population confirmed to be inspected will be better than the current system. The number of downs is much higher.
Mina said in the podcast "Virus of the Week": "We are so focused on high-end and expensive testing that we can't detect anyone at all. Maybe all we need is simple testing tools."
He pointed out that the rapid test paper is cheap and can be used frequently, saying that if it cannot detect 5% of the spreaders of the virus, but it can detect 85% of the spreaders, it is already larger than the current situation. victory. Harvard Institute of Global Health Director Jia A also said on Monday that even if the rapid detection tool misses half of the cases, if it is tested twice a week, it will eventually be detected. The FDA currently does not allow the sale of any rapid inspection tools that cost only US$1 to US$5 (approximately RM4.2 to RM21).
**Info & Image are taken online
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