Show HN: A Covid-19 testing location site that a group of us are building

Over the last week DataDrivenMD and I were able to pull together 15 developers to get this out. The speed that we were able to cobble together a team that can work smoothly, 100% remotely from all different organizations has been amazing. The crisis action team for the state of CA has reached out to see if they can collaborate with us, and we’re doing our best to understand how to work with state and local governments going forward.

Thanks to the fantastic volunteers, we have we were able to refactor early, away from the junk front end I built, to something that we can actually scale on the front and back end. We’re currently struggling with how to scale our collection and updating of test locations as they spring up, and we hope to build an application to allow providers to submit their locations on their own. Right now that whole process is manual, based on manually scraping/validating locations that are publicly stating they are doing testing. If infrastructure existed to identify places that are testing, we would be using it, but it doesn’t as far as we know, so we’re building the communication infrastructure for these test sites as it starts forming.

We’re US only right now but if we can get to a scalable way to collect test location data we can be worldwide.

This is a 100% volunteer effort explicitly for public good. We will not monetize the site, sell access to any resources we have, or in any way monetarily or personally benefit from this project, we have no plans to continue as a group any longer than we need to. No single organization is sponsoring this, and we have credits from GCP and AWS to run our infrastructure so Jorge and I don't go broke!

Please help us: Post in this thread any feedback, suggestions for scaling how we source and verify testing location data (manual currently), or anything you think useful! We’ll be monitoring the thread.

Our code is 100% FOSS: https://github.com/codersagainstcovidorg/covid19testing-map. We're available at @findcovidtest on twitter and contact@codersagainstcovid.org. Thanks!

"If you think you have COVID-19 and your illness is mild, you do not need to see your health care provider and you will not be tested. Getting tested will not change what your provider will tell you to do to get better. They will tell you to stay home so you do not get others sick.

Unless you are hospitalized and a diagnosis will impact your care, you will not be tested. Limiting testing protects health care workers and saves essential medical supplies, such as masks and gloves, that are in short supply."

https://www1.nyc.gov/site/doh/health/health-topics/coronavir...

This is amazing. Thank guys so much for building something like this. Rapidly building up access to, and information on testing sites is one of the most important things we can do right now.

Our leadership (in the USA) certainly isn’t doing it. I feel like anytime I say we should follow the example of countries who focused on testing, I’m immediately rebuffed with talking points, excuses why it won’t work, or why we should just hide in our house for an undetermined amount of time.

This is one of the best Covid-19 related projects I’ve seen come across the front page. You guys identified one of the most pressing problems, and figured out how to get it done.

Thank you so much!

I was pleasantly surprised that there is a testing centre 3 blocks from my apartment (i don't know where else I could have found this information).

I also really like this "Unless you are explicitly told otherwise, you MUST complete your self-isolation period - even if your test result is negative for COVID-19." I'm quite concerned by hypochondriac's and general attention seekers spamming the test system, being forced to self-isolate regardless is a perfect deterrent.

I have a tangentially related question, hoping that someone knowledgeable can answer. What are the main bottlenecks to scaling testing, in particular in the following stages:

- the supply of virus-specific reagents (primers, perhaps virus-specific reporting probes - are these necessary, or can just generic reporters be used?)

- the supply of other reagents (in case of PCR, polymerase, nucleotide material, buffer)

- the supply of disposable testing equipment. I know that swabs are in short supply for some reason, anything else?

- safety in handling both the samples and the amplified product (can you basically flush the processed sample down the toilet, or do you need to handle it with extreme precautions)

People need to call their local non-emergency line for instructions if they have symptoms.

This map is incomplete by your own admission, which makes it practically misinformation.

We don't need guerrilla tactics in this war.

Oscar was started by Jared K, (tRUMP's S-I-L). Visitors of their site (at hioscar-dot-com-slash-covid19) are given a "free" assessment and referral to a testing center. So far so good, right?

In the back end, a "service fee" is charged to the Fed Govt for each person that uses the system. Being that Jared's in the family, there's no doubt that Oscar will get paid everything it asks for.

In the US, how much help is testing now other than to sample the population to get an idea of the spread?

Would it not be more interesting to know how well people are self isolating? Finding out where the message isn't getting through?

But please don't just go there to check if you have corona unless you have some of the symptoms. Otherwise you are going to flood the already strained system.

cmiiw, by default the website shows locations which are not public health agencies and "checks patients for symptoms" and if we want to see all locations which provide COVID-19 testing we need to enable (toggle) radio button "Offers COVID-19 testing" in filter which is present in flyout at top left corner. Correct?

When I need to be tested, I don't want to phone several providers but I want to find the closest free slot for a test that suits my needs. E.g. if I don't have symptoms, I cannot use an antibody test.

It is insane that this is not being done by the government, and that it's left to random coders to throw this together in their free time.

Edit: This item's page doesn't work on iPad. After three seconds, the page freezes.