
Paul Buchheit: A Possible Third Solution to End the Pandemic - axiomdata316
http://paulbuchheit.blogspot.com/2020/04/a-third-solution.html?m=1
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touringa
Longform article from a few days ago (August 2020), almost seems like a
followup to Paul's April blog.

[https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2020/08/how-to-
te...](https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2020/08/how-to-test-every-
american-for-covid-19-every-day/615217/)

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sradman
Michael Mina is promoting self-administered daily lateral flow [1] paper strip
tests while Paul’s startup PreDxion Bio [2] is working on a SPR [3] device
which I think is an alternative to Isothermal PCR devices like the Abbott
ID.Now and the Canadian exclusive Spartan Cube.

I think Michael Mina’s core contribution is mapping the PCR Cycle Threshold
(CT) value to transmissible viral load (CT < 24).

Rapid tests need to be benchmarked against samples with CT values of 24 or
less. Paper tests meet this benchmark.

[1]
[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lateral_flow_test](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lateral_flow_test)

[2] [https://www.predxionbio.com/](https://www.predxionbio.com/)

[3]
[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surface_plasmon_resonance](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surface_plasmon_resonance)

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hhas01
“Friday, April 24, 2020”

“If all goes well, there will be millions of scanners deployed by this fall”

Ageing well…

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tdeck
UIUC is going to test all students twice a week, and has the capacity to run
10,000 tests per day. I wish other institutions would copy their methodology
and build upon it.

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sitkack
Our pocket computers should have the necessary sensors to dynamically test for
all kinds of diseases.

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caryd
Deluseional pipedream disguised as information.

Let's make a test for heart disease we can take every day. Let's make a test
for cancer to spot the first mutated cell. Let's invent a time machine to fix
it all.

There are three solutions, but not yours.

1\. Open everything as long as the curve is flattened to rush to herd
immunity. This was the plan. Why did it change?

2\. Wait 2 years for a cure.

3\. Allow willing participants to get the virus to make vaccine tests better.
It will be cured in 2 months. We allow people to sign up for war and risk
their lives. Do the same with science.

~~~
zelphirkalt
Number 3 makes me wonder: Do you think they have a lack of patients?! Why
would we need any extra for testing?

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aaron695
You could do things like see if they can catch it from touch. Or 3 meters
social distancing.

Then when they get it you can do further tests, tracking everything from day
of conception.

All with top notch the best hospital care, so their risk would be similar
overall as being in the community.

I'd do it for fun, even without extra hospital care.

Millions will die because of University ethics committees.

[OT] I really like the Interrobang ‽I wish keyboards had it.

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hhas01
“Millions will die because of University ethics committees.”

Uh-huh.

[https://www.cdc.gov/tuskegee/timeline.htm](https://www.cdc.gov/tuskegee/timeline.htm)

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aaron695
I did wonder which of the two cliche examples would be pulled out ;)

Also everything by Milgram, Pavlov, Zimbardo, Jane Elliott, Ron Jones, My
favourite - Schachter and Singer (Misattribution of arousal)

Basically anything classical you read about on HN about psychology no longer
passes ethics.

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hhas01
“cliche examples”

Well that’s certainly a perspective.

