Whoa. Yet another “Your kid has had close exposure…”, plus
need to test before returning to school has been reinstated, regardless of vaccination status
which means, apparently, effectively a 5 day quarantine waiting to get to the need-to-test day
since so may people are sick, the school is going remote learning for a day to disinfect the place
The area around the school (which isn’t close to where we live) has rampant covid, apparently. We’ll see if he brings it to our neighborhood and our house.
Is this explicitly stated? If not, I’d be tempted to just test now and if it’s negative, send him back anyway. Maybe test again in 5 days for your own peace of mind.
At least, if you’ve got tests to burn and he’s vaccinated, that’s what I’d be tempted to do.
I don’t know about other districts, but our school testing has to be PCR or observed over video if rapid, which not all tests support. And since PCR is free to the consumer and video proctored tests aren’t, most here go that route. So about 3 days from scheduling to results.
That’s nuts. If a lot of people have those rules, I’d think there would be a market for your local pharmacist to administer a rapid test, leave it sitting for 15 minutes, and then certify the result.
Rapid testing performed at the pharmacy is an option here, and it’s exactly as you described, but the appointments are hard to come by. Well, they were when cases were high when we needed to test. Probably not now.
Yeah, by quarantine, they don’t mean he needs to be locked up - just that he can’t come to school. They’re calling it quarantine, but they have no say in what you’re doing outside of the school.
And it dawned on me this evening that the “quarantine” effectively ends up not being a quarantine for him anyway. He was out today for a doctor’s appointment anyway, which is already day 1 from exposure. Tomorrow is the zoom school day. He’d already had another doctor’s appointment set for Friday. And then we’ve got the weekend. So the zoom day is the only difference for him.
I still have to get him tested, though.
Their test rules (which I think they got from the county) are odd. You can’t come back until you have the results. They don’t care if it is rapid or not. But if you don’t do rapid, you’ll be out longer. If you do both (which is what most of the drive up places that popped up around me have been), you have to wait for the rests of both tests. So, basically, if you want your kid back in school soonest, you’ll want to only take the rapid test. We were told this by someone at the school. But the school wouldn’t know that two tests were taken unless you told them, as far as I an tell.
At least for today, there’s a huge difference in infection and testing between where we live and where the school is (they’re about 40 miles apart). I’ve heard testing is swamped near the school, but, at least for now, is easy by me.
I scheduled my next blood donation with the Red Cross. If they’re still doing antibody testing next month, I’ll find out if I still belong here. Now I’ve probably jinxed myself to catch COVID before then.
They’re no longer providing results on whether you have antibodies from a vaccine or from COVID, only if you have adequate antibodies to use your blood for convalescence. Which is still good info (I still have very high antibody levels) but frustrating because I wanted to know if I ever had COVID, dammit.
can you not just go to any place that draws blood and ask for an antibody test that specifically gives you the info on the antibodies that means you had covid? why do you need to donate blood to get this info?
i have no reason to bother since i’m like close to 100% sure i never had covid.
I would imagine you would have to pay for that test out of pocket, as I assume that insurance companies would say there were no medically necessary reasons for that test.
I’m curious if it’s free and convenient (I donate blood anyway). I looked to see how much to do it out of pocket but it seems that the local places do the spike protein one like NA mentioned above which will be positive if you’ve been vaccinated or had COVID. I’d want the one that’s specific to past COVID infection.
I don’t think so. Qwest and CVS both offer tests for pay that tell you if you have antibodies to the spike protein. I haven’t been able to find anyone who would test me for the nucleocapsid protein without my doctor recommending it, and that’s what you need to learn if your had covid. I asked my doctor for that test, and he said he’d do it, but my insurance might not pay. But i spent some time looking to just get it on my own before asking him for it.
took a full bus to my parents house last night to stay here for a while. most people were wearing masks. some were not.
my father lives downstairs and my mother upstairs. i stay upstairs, but go downstairs sometimes to visit. i was gonna put off doing the downstairs part for a few days in case of covid, but my mother insisted i say hello to my father, so i did.
i probably didn’t get covid during that bus trip, but you never know. i wore an N95 the entire time. also had jury duty last tuesday. i assume i’d have symptoms by now if i caught it there though.
Scratchy, sore throat for two days. Rapid tests say no covid, yet again, but have a PCR test scheduled for tomorrow morning anyway. So tired of this. So tired of my kids picking up germs again.
