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Comment by legionof7 | Hacker News Reader

If I could test myself continuously, I would. Why would you not?

Tests like this have false positive rates that are significant. The test may be a useful tool when we already reasonably expect someone to test positive (showing symptoms plus contact with a known case or travel from an affected area).

However, if you have no reason to believe you are infected, a false positive might easily be more likely than a true positive. And in fact, even a very modest false positive rate would still make it orders of magnitude more likely than a true positive.

Consider that even if you assume the worst about the state of the virus in the US, it's probably a few thousand people. If you randomly tested every person in the US, and the test had a false positive rate of only 1%, you would have thousands of times more positive results than real cases. Someone else in this thread mentioned an existing test that might have a 40% false positive rate.

because it never works like that, never that simple, there are always bigger costs

in the end this will be used against you and others

next thing you know you are not allowed on a bus if you haven't tested yourself today

I think that the argument “it never works like that” should be coupled with at least one data point.

I don’t think it’s helpful to dismiss other commenters based upon simply your opinion, and not a set of facts we can all inspect together.

"never works like that" was meant to reflect that naive, knee jerk solutions never account for all the complexities of the problem and do more harm than good.

distributing COVID tests to the population is a ridiculous idea that does not do anything but create more panic and trouble.

The problem that needs a solution has nothing to do with whether Random Jane can or cannot (in the privacy of their home) determine if they are infected.

For what is worth, there are people out there, not even few, that would knowingly seek to infect others especially if they themselves suffer almost no effects from the disease. They would do it just for the "lulz". Have you considered that? Being infected, knowing it and suffering no ill effects is an evil superpower.

there are still no facts and no sources in your argument. I cannot and will not engage in this sort of meaningless argumentation without data.

Please stop

This is mindless hysteria. And I suspect you know it. On the other hand, maybe you do, in fact, believe it. Let's make a good faith attempt to test how truly we believe in our predictions. I predict that the Gates Foundation permitting home testing in Seattle will not result in Seattle's public transit system only permitting COVID-19 tested individuals by the end of 2020. In order to back that, I will put up $1000 at even odds. Reply here to take me up on it.

What's your prediction and will you back it like I did?

Hysteria: emotional excess.

Not sure why you assume "hysteria" on my side. My opinion could be wrong, but that does not make it a hysteria. Isn't the fear of COVID more a hysteria?

As for your bet - it is overly specific - there could be thousands of similar, equally negative outcomes that would not be in Seattle, or a bus company, etc yet could all be triggered the same way.

I would be most worried of people that want to infect others about finding out anonymously that they are infectious.

The Gates Foundation is only issuing home testing kits in Seattle so it's hard to argue for elsewhere. However, I'm comfortable negotiating the terms. What are yours? I'd like to have a conclusion within a reasonable time so no bet lasting 50 years or anything, but otherwise, let's hear your offer.

EDIT: Due to old comments, I'm rate-limited on this thread so I actually cannot respond (sorry!). I'm interested specifically in the statement about the bus.

my offer is that in two years we look back at this and a reasonable majority of health professionals will say:

"you know that home testing by Gates was not such a good idea, overall it caused more harm than good"

My view is that is a dangerous idea to have untrained, panick people decide if they are sick or not. Too many things can and will go wrong.

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