A Covid-19 test that processes saliva samples and does not require special swabs or collection devices received emergency-use authorization by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration on Saturday. SalivaDirect test is expected to be priced at $10 per sample. Cheap, fast saliva-based test could boost testing frequency. Research for the test was done by Yale University’s School of Public Health and was partly funded by the National Basketball Association and the union representing NBA players. The rapid detection test, known as SalivaDirect, “is groundbreaking in terms of efficiency and avoiding shortages of crucial test components like reagents,” FDA Commissioner Stephen…
Author: Brett Johnson
SUMMARY: NPR reports more than 8 in 10 supported aggressive new measures by the federal government, including expanded testing are needed. The author suggests we have relied on poorly coordinated efforts among 50 states and thousands of local jurisdictions to solve a national problem. “The United States is not currently on course to get control of this epidemic,” said a Johns Hopkins University report. “It is time to reset.”. The writer suggests testing every American once a week for four weeks. There’s a model for this idea. In March, the Broad Institute of Harvard and MIT converted its lab into a…
Opinion in the Wall Street Journal describes a Covid-19 therapy using “medicinal signaling cells,” or MSCs, which are found on blood vessels throughout the body. These cells eliminate the virus, calm the immune overreaction known as a cytokine storm, and repair damaged lung tissue. According to the author who is a co-founder of a company in this space, this combination is offered by no other drug, making this a regenerative medicine that could be as revolutionary as Jonas Salk’s polio vaccine. NOTE: Share price of Osiris (the company developing this technology) rose dramatically after this article appeared, moving from .03…
Current tests for active infection of COVID-19 are given long after the infected person has stopped transmitting making results virtually useless for public-health efforts to contain the pandemic. Harvard professor makes the case that our current approach is all wrong. The vast majority of PCR positive tests we currently collect are finding people for whom we can’t even act because they are done transmitting and that rapid and inexpensive tests even with low sensitivity can better address the challenge. FDA policy is slowing these tests to market. AT THE MOMENT, THE UNITED STATES has no semblance of public-health testing” for…
Ingelsby, Director of Health at Johns Hopkins fields questions about the unpreparedness of our health system. “How is it that we are in a shortage situation again?” He says that it is the nature of a continued problem and that a national dashboard to provide visibility to the supply chain for PPE and tests would help greatly.