That's grim.

https://www.startribune.com/health-officials-encourage-more-minnesotans-to-seek-testing-for-covid-19/570343811/

Governor Walz's self-described "moon shot" testing expansion is falling up short because while his goal was 20,000 tests per day, less than 10,000 people are even seeking testing. Kare11 puts it at "about 5000"
The public demand for testing is simply too low, so while his program successfully achieved the capacity goal, its not being put to use.

I guess this might herald a next step in the process, I'd think it would be logical for excess testing to be made available to high-contact essential jobs like grocery store clerks and have them tested on a regular basis even while asymptomatic.
If the state could start aiming (preferably non-compulsory) testing closer to the threat points, I think it would be a good way to direct the resources to where they would be best put to use

This post was edited by Goomshill on May 9 2020 07:42pm

Clever and widespread testing is THE key ingredient for a successful reopening of society. Using idle testing capacities for samples of non-symptomatic groups is highly recommendable, since this can allow us to detect emerging new infection clusters before there is a noticeable number of symptomatic cases, which is exactly what we need to stop a new, emerging hotspot in its tracks. Here in Europe, we're currently starting to have exactly this debate.

Here in Germany, this week's substantial loosening of restrictions was accompanied by a "backstop": if the 7-day incidence of new cases exceeds 50 cases per 100 000 inhabitants in a certain county, then this county has to (re)enact restrictions. The Green party has yesterday made their best proposal in years, which is to introduce a tiered system:

• "green" counties with a 7-day incidence of under 10 cases per 100k are only testing symptomatic cases
  
• "yellow" counties with a 7-day incidence between 10 and 25 cases per 100k also test random samples of exposed personnel like nurses and store clerks
  
• "orange" counties with a 7-day incidence between 26 and 50 cases per 100k take random samples of their entire population and test all exposed and/or high-risk groups
  
• "red" counties with a 7-day incidence above 50 cases per 100k enact new restriction and test everyone.

Edit: and yes, of course the government has to pay for all of this testing. Might be a bitter pill to swallow for those Americans who still believe in non-universal healthcare, but there's really no other choice in a pandemic situation.

This post was edited by Black XistenZ on May 10 2020 12:43am

Flashback to the libtards complaining about "not enough tests"

Not a contradcition. The US would have needed more tests than were available at an earlier stage of the pandemic.
And, like I said: all public health experts agree that excessive testing is paramount for reopening the country while keeping the virus under control. This is what South Korea, Taiwan and Singapore did.

And of course it is bullshit to draw conclusions from the availability of tests in a state like Minnesota, which is not heavily hit yet and geographically distant from all hotspots, to their availability in the rest of the country.
You can easily imagine a situation where, at the same time, testing capacities are sorely lacking in New York and New Jersey while there are more available than needed in Minnesota.

This post was edited by Black XistenZ on May 10 2020 01:17am

Massive testing is useful to maintain low amounts, here we will do massive testing at the "re-opening".

Oh boy and I hadn't seen this before I posted that
https://www.npr.org/2020/05/07/851712311/u-s-field-hospitals-stand-down-most-without-treating-any-covid-19-patients
https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2020/05/faucis-follies-us-coronavirus-field-hospitals-shut-without-treating-single-patient-garbage-models-used-us-experts/


The corps of engineers constructed numerous field hospitals for the crisis, I knew a few people in management on those projects
Total budget was $660 million
they created capacity for 14,817 beds at the same time
they treated a total of 1,177 patients, of which 1,095 were at the NYC Javits center field hospital with 1900 beds and $11m budget
meaning that of the other 12,917 beds, only 82 patients were treated
those hospitals are now being decommissioned

To repeat. Of the 12917 beds constructed and nurses standing ready to treat patients, only 82 were treated. At a cost of $650 million. Approximately $800k per patient.
Of the 17 largest facilities they had on record, 9 had treated 0 patients total, and 4 were not completed

These were all constructed under the projections of hospital beds being overwhelmed, with a need to 'flatten the curve' so the healthcare system wouldn't be overwhelmed

This post was edited by Goomshill on May 10 2020 03:45am

So, useless preventive measures or corruption ?

massive testing has just one big disadvantage, at least according to trump: "it will increase our numbers, and i don't like that".

the idiot actually said the quiet part out loud again...

Lol