Morning Briefing
Summaries of health policy coverage from major news organizations
Worries That 174,000 Utahns Weren't Told Their Covid Test May Be Wrong
The Salt Lake Tribune: 174,000 People In Utah Weren’t Told Their Coronavirus Test Results Could’ve Been Wrong
Federal officials worried that more than 174,000 coronavirus patient test results from an Orem lab used by TestUtah were potentially wrong — but none of the people who were tested early in the pandemic were told, documents obtained by The Salt Lake Tribune show. Testing at Timpanogos Regional Hospital may have produced accurate results. Or its lab may have produced false negatives or false positives, according to documents and interviews with people familiar with the matter. (Becker, 1/30)
In other news about covid tests —
NPR: New Hampshire Will Sell Rapid COVID-19 Tests In Liquor Stores
If you live in New Hampshire and are having trouble getting an at-home rapid COVID-19 test, you might soon find them among the bottles at state-run liquor stores. The New Hampshire Executive Council approved the request to sell 1 million at-home rapid COVID tests at liquor outlets across the state, Gov. Christopher Sununu said. The governor said he expects the at-home tests to be available at liquor stores within the next two weeks. "We will buy them for a certain price. We will put them on the shelves and sell them for that exact same price, approximately in the $13 range," Sununu said during a news conference this week. (Franklin, 1/28)
Detroit Free Press: Free COVID-19 Tests Available At Detroit Libraries, To Vulnerable Communities
Free COVID-19 tests are coming to Detroit and other communities in Michigan vulnerable to the coronavirus through two programs, including a new one announced Friday. The Detroit Public Library will be handing out COVID-19 tests Tuesday at its main location and permanent branches. The number of free tests from the state health department will be "extremely limited" and will be given on a first-come, first-served basis from 1 p.m. to 4 p.m. or until quantities run out. (Hall, 1/28)
AP: Albuquerque Is Distributing About 80K At-Home COVID-19 Tests
Some 80,000 at-home COVID-19 tests are beginning to be handed out by city officials in areas of Albuquerque determined to need them the most. The supplies are from the federal government and the distribution has started in areas of high social vulnerability. (1/30)
CNBC: How The U.S. Is Trying To Fix Its At-Home Covid Testing Problem
The latest Covid-19 wave during the busy holiday travel season caught the U.S. flat-footed when it came to one key tool in its pandemic-fighting arsenal: at-home rapid tests. “In the United States, we haven’t had federal guidance on how to make testing a regular part of your daily life or your daily week,” said Lindsey Dawson, a policy analyst at the Kaiser Family Foundation, in an interview with CNBC. “A comparison is the U.K., where it’s recommended people over 11 test twice a week. And in the U.S., if everybody over 11 tested twice a week, we would need 2.3 billion tests per month, and we’re not there.” (Higgins-Dunn, 1/28)
KHN: States Were Sharing Covid Test Kits. Then Omicron Hit
In a few short months, states have gone from donating surplus rapid covid-19 tests to states with shortages to hoarding them as demand driven by the spike in cases strains supplies. Last January, North Dakota had amassed 2.7 million Abbott Laboratories BinaxNOW rapid covid tests from the federal government — roughly 3½ tests for each person in the state of 775,000 people. (Houghton, 1/31)
KHN: It’s Day 6 Of Covid, And A Rapid Antigen Test Comes Back Positive. Stay Home, Say Virologists
What does it mean if a person’s rapid antigen test result comes back positive after five days of isolation due to covid-19? According to the experts, that person is most likely still carrying a viral load high enough to infect others. “Anytime you’re positive by one of these rapid at-home covid tests, it means that you’ve still got a really high level of the viral protein, and most experts are interpreting that as a high level of virus present in your nasal passage,” said Matthew Binnicker, director of clinical virology at the Mayo Clinic and president of the Pan American Society for Clinical Virology. (Bichell, 1/31)
In updates on contact tracing —
Oklahoman: Oklahoma Health Departments To Move Away From COVID-19 Contact Tracing
The state Health Department and health departments for Oklahoma and Tulsa counties issued a joint announcement Thursday saying they’d be moving away from universal case investigations and contact tracing for COVID-19. In part because of how the omicron variant has led to more cases than ever — many of which are less severe and detected through at-home testing — investigators and epidemiologists will instead focus on outbreaks and clusters in high-risk settings, the departments said. (Branham, 1/28)
