Thread: Corona Virus

Originally Posted by Xtreme

When considering the low Covid cases among aboriginals one needs to take into account the fact that Aboriginal communities have very little contact outside their own community which is probably the main reason for the low rate of infection.

AFAIK, there were no COVID community cases in far North Qld, or Far North WA for that matter. [ indigenous or non-indigenous ] Decentralisation and isolation seems to be the key .

Don’t forget less than 20% of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders live in remote areas - but yes had Coronavirus got into isolated communities it could have been more devastating than what we have seen in aged care homes as these are very high risk groups.

The decisions to close access to remote communities has been successful and most remain closed today.

However, most indigenous people live in urban areas and fortunately within these population groups they are also under represented in the number of cases.

A lot of the credit goes to Pat Turner, the niece of Charlie Perkins, who saw how devastating the H1N1 flu was where Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders accounted for 16% of hospitalisations and 12% of all deaths despite only being 3% of the population, and she was determined not to let it happen again.

When it came to COVID-19, Indigenous Australians sent it packing

Aunty Pat is an outstanding leader. It is a great story and one to celebrate during NAIDOC week.

Is anyone else tired of looking up people's nostrils all the time, as with the C-19 a lot of people are dialling in on their laptops which they leave low down on their desk? Maybe this should be in the grumpy old buggers thread?

Originally Posted by DiscoDB

The count of COVID cases in the US is going up quicker than the count for votes. Not a good situation in both cases.

Speaking of 'counts' (actually this is a minor hijack...) It's surprising to discover that the American CDC recommends that PCR is taken up to 40 cycles / count. Each cycle is a doubling, so running a high number is going to yield lots of unreliable results or false positives. 30 seems to be regarded as 'safe'. Going to higher numbers is going to give Positive tests on the nasal swabs... before being used !

I've put this in another place, but here's a usefully simple explanation. Keep in mind that our diagnosis is being done back to front..... Previously, a patient's symptoms were the guide.... "Tests" were only used to confirm or expand a suspicion of diagnosis. Now, we ignore presentation and go straight to a 'diagnostic' test (that isn't) and call it a CASE.
Not only but also, due to false positives or responding to remnants of past man-flu, the frightening CASE numbers soar.... grist for the mill of impending lockdown - to stop the spread.!

Anyway, from a front line in a land far away:- How accurate are the covid tests? - Sebastian Rushworth M.D.

There is no credible evidence of the PCR tests giving false positives other than by contamination. The best evidence that is easily available to confirm this is that in both Victoria and NSW over the last week or so testing has proceeded at a rate of tens of thousands of tests per day, without a single positive test except in a few quarantine cases. This clearly shows that the false positive rate is well under 0.01%. And it is clearly not a case of false negatives either, as the same tests, in Melbourne over the last few months, were able to accurately find and eventually allow control by tracing and isolation, an outbreak that resulted in hundreds of deaths.

The antibody tests, on the other hand, are far less accurate, and while they have a high (some manufacturers of them even point to 30%) rate of false negatives, they have a low false positive rate - but note that a positive result for antibodies can persist long after recovery and when the case is no longer infectious. And note that this applies to sewage sampling as well.

I was at my doctors the other day and asked 'What is your opinion of this Covid thing'?

He replied, 'I don't know. I'm not a journalist'!

Breaking news. Hope it's not what I think it may be.


BREAKING NEWS: Three people test positive for Covid-19 in SA outside of hotel quarantine