Re:Order your rapid tests from the USPS (US only)
by h2hq on Tuesday January 18, 2022 @02:48PM
(#29984702)
I think the point is that rapid tests are performing significantly worse now on Omicron than they were for prior variants.
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Re:Order your rapid tests from the USPS (US only)
by dragontamer on Tuesday January 18, 2022 @04:20PM
(#29986005)
I'm going to "vouch" your post, because its a fine point even if I disagree with it.
Rapid tests _always_ had bad sensitivity. Its gotten worse for Omicron, but going from "bad" to "worse" isn't really a big deal, because you never should have been relying upon negative test results anyway.
That's my point. The "use" of rapid tests was their "rapid" nature, coming back with a result in 15 minutes is way better than waiting for 3 days. The PCR is needed if you want to truly rely upon the result (well, kinda sorta. PCR got better sensitivity / specificity but its still not perfect).
Re:Order your rapid tests from the USPS (US only)
by h2hq on Tuesday January 18, 2022 @06:36PM
(#29987738)
This comment misses that false-positive and false-negative rates are wildly different.
The rapid tests are still quite useful because a positive test is very reliable and saves you several days of waiting for PCR results.
Perhaps the test results should be labeled "Yes, you have covid", and "meh, not sure".