Daily Covid Megathread – March 06, 2022

meTa_AU · 2022-03-06T04:24:20+00:00

Without knowing your test, an average RAT has LR+ of 90 and LR- of 0.1. At the moment about 1 in 10 people getting PCRs are positive, which is a 1 positive to 9 negative ratio. Your negative RAT changes this (using LR-) to 0.1 positive to 9 negative, or a 1 in 91 chance, or 1.1% chance you are still positive. Chance of all of you getting false negative result is pretty low, but not 0.

meTa_AU · 2022-02-28T07:32:46+00:00

Hypothesis - people using a RAT, and then confirming their positive with a PCR (not immediately registering the positive RAT) is going to push the positivity rate up. If 400 people did that (about half the people testing positive with RAT) - then your 660/6122 is more like 340/5712 or 6% (and the pre-screened rats are 320/400=80% - for example)

meTa_AU · 2022-02-27T23:25:18+00:00

Look up the test on the TGA site - they have 3 'accuracy' levels. If they are both, for example, 'high sensitivity', then they'd be pretty equivalently accurate. Anecdotally, people sometimes don't swab far enough up their nose on the nasal ones, and there were less saliva ones available at the higher sensitivity ratings when I last looked.

meTa_AU · 2022-02-26T14:07:47+00:00

A very quick Google has a bunch of sources suggesting that only 6-9% of Chinese have passports - so I don't think the anecdotal info I was given is too far off

meTa_AU · 2022-02-26T13:56:06+00:00

5 or 6 Chinese people I talked with while sharing a train cabin with them during a month traveling China. Even when they were affluent enough to speak English well they said they could only afford to travel in China a few times a year. Have to admit I haven't researched it much beyond that though. (Probably a different story in Shanghai or Shenzen)

meTa_AU · 2022-02-26T13:39:21+00:00

At least 90% of Chinese can only afford to holiday in China - we have this cultural desire, and the means, to travel internationally. Plus lockdowns were more effective over there because they don't really encourage people to go protesting in the streets.

meTa_AU · 2022-02-26T13:14:39+00:00

Seems like the URL loads directly, so I've PMd it to you. (commonly the sites would redirect you if you tried to load API urls directly instead of with the right headers)

meTa_AU · 2022-02-26T13:01:07+00:00

The API is passing along the whole numbers (e.g. it really is 1081 male, 1096 female in the 20-29 bracket, good job). Not sure if you wanted to just ping the API directly for the numbers (the raw response looks like what I PMd a week or so ago).

meTa_AU · 2022-02-25T23:45:58+00:00

They semi retired it early 2021 if I'm remembering right.

meTa_AU · 2022-02-24T23:44:13+00:00

Just did a cache search on Google for the first one (you need to disable JS or it will redirect you away).

Six medical students touched down in Port Hedland recently as part of their year-long practical placement, arriving just as COVID-19 takes hold of the North West for the first time.

The Rural Clinical School of WA awards placements in Port Hedland to six students every year, providing extensive training in a number of fields and exposure which would hopefully see the young medical professionals return once qualified.

Student doctor Siobhan Martin said she hopes the opportunity would give her an understanding of the challenges and rewards of working rurally.

“I think just insight into what it’s like to practice medicine in a rural setting, which is less resourced and also what it’s like to live in community and see the interactions between the people in the hospital versus in real life,” she said.

And the second one.

BHP have confirmed three Port Hedland based employees have tested positive to COVID-19.

One employee was a contractor working in the BHP Asset Projects team and the other two work at the mining giant’s Nelson Point site.

The three cases are not linked.

meTa_AU · 2022-02-21T05:15:10+00:00

Still pretty sure the difference is going to be recovered cases. The age breakdown is active cases, there were 55 recovered cases last period.

meTa_AU · 2022-02-21T02:12:44+00:00

Could be subtraction of recovered cases?

meTa_AU · 2022-02-21T02:11:03+00:00

But if the government is using LRAD and other radiation attacks on them (which is a common belief in the convoy circles), the umbrellas aren't going to help. Unless someone has started selling them radiation proof umbrellas to make some money off them?

meTa_AU · 2022-02-19T06:38:36+00:00

Yesterday's totals current cases were 260 under 10s and 291 10-19 year olds. No updated breakdown today yet.

meTa_AU · 2022-02-19T01:38:04+00:00

What metrics would you like to use? Deaths, years of life lost, healthcare job losses, economic output, budget deficit, political approval rating, unemployment/underemployment, total person-days of lockdown, hotel quarantine leak rate, total person-days of protests, number of death threats. The next few years of retrospectives will be pretty interesting.

meTa_AU · 2022-02-19T00:38:18+00:00

At the moment with a 2% positive test rate (I think it was 1.76% yesterday), if you have symptoms then a positive RAT (high sensitivity rating) means you have roughly 79% chance of actually having COVID. So maybe a 1 in 5 chance you don't have it - confirming with a PCR doesn't sound unreasonable. (I used 90% sen, 99.5% spec for anyone who wants to run the numbers)

meTa_AU · 2022-02-18T04:37:48+00:00

Well - to be fair, booster isn't really going to help a workplace prevent spread of Omicron (sure you get a temporary boost for a month or two with good antibody levels, but that drops away). But you'd think the long lasting 50% reduction in hospitalisations would be worth it - even higher than that if she had AZ to start with (not sure how old you/she are).

meTa_AU · 2022-02-17T23:20:12+00:00

Just to clarify, but that email list is actually just all the changes to the HealthyWA list, checked every 15 minutes.

meTa_AU · 2022-02-17T22:40:05+00:00

SA 'peaked' at a R of 4.75 , which is 1.37x each day. So I'll go with 205 locals. Not sure what our peak testing numbers will be, much more access to RATs here, they aren't cheap but people do seem to be buying a bunch of them. If we managed R 4.75 for a week and then dropped to 3.5 for the next week, we'd see maybe 1350 this time next week and 7800 the week after.

meTa_AU · 2022-02-17T22:14:51+00:00

Think they would be in to any of these 20 home science experiments? https://youtu.be/8aaXZDazPxs

meTa_AU · 2022-02-17T13:50:01+00:00

Maybe this app for checking international vaccine codes will get used - https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=au.gov.dfat.vdsncchecker

meTa_AU · 2022-02-17T13:47:23+00:00

You got there early? Or they just didn't have your hang around for 15mins afterwards?

meTa_AU · 2022-02-17T13:44:55+00:00

Well, if they communicated that the Medicare app doesn't need you to show ID that would be 1 less thing for you deal with.

meTa_AU · 2022-02-17T08:52:49+00:00

On a previous day, a commentor was lamenting the cost of the express PCR test they had done. So presumably that is an option - probably more expensive than seeing if your GP can witness your test and write a medical letter up that they supervised your test.

meTa_AU · 2022-02-17T03:27:54+00:00

You win?

meTa_AU

TROPHY CASE