Although the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is not including positive rapid tests in its total Covid-19 case counts, the tests are still important for making individual decisions about behavior, CDC Director Dr. Rochelle Walensky said Tuesday.
“We have been using the PCR test — not the rapid test — the lab tests, the molecular tests, to really capture our case counts and really get a good view of where we are in terms of the epidemiology, anticipating what was going to be coming into the hospitals,” Walensky said in a Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee hearing.
“The self-tests are a really important, valuable tool for people to empower themselves, their own health, to not expose themselves to other people, to get some information about their own health,” she added.
Walensky said those who feel sick and test positive should talk to a physician, but those who are asymptomatic can use a positive rapid test to figure out whether they need to isolate and how much contact they should have with other people.
“I think that it's less about the absolute case count of understanding whether you have asymptomatic infection or a runny nose and your rapid test is positive than it is really about empowering you to do the right thing and not be forward-transmitting,” she said.
Walensky said other countries, like the UK, are including rapid tests in their case count, “but they too, while they capture more than we have tried to, they also agree that they're missing some as well.” ...
