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Beijing adds anal swab tests to COVID arsenal, but citizens are not taking it lying down

Anal swab test diagram, China
International 
Phillip Charlier 3 Comments , ,

Some Chinese citizens are avoiding going home for the Lunar New Year holidays after Beijing health authorities introduced anal swab tests for COVID-19. Citizens were quoted in various media reports including Apple Daily, as saying that they would prefer to miss the holidays rather than undergo what they consider to be an intrusive, insulting, and humiliating procedure. “Everyone involved will be so embarrassed,” one user wrote on Chinese social media site ­Weibo. A poll on Weibo showed that 80% of

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China claims 10.9 million COVID tests in Qingdao City all negative: Taiwan’s Health Minister says “impossible”

Chen Shih-chung coughs during press conference
Health and Safety 
Phillip Charlier 0 Comment , , , ,

Chinese officials claimed yesterday that COVID-19 tests on 10.9 million people in Qingdao City, Shandong Province, had all returned negative results, but Taiwan’s Health Minister, Chen Shih-chung (陳時中), said today that such a result was impossible. Citywide tests for Qingdao City’s population of 11 million were ordered after a cluster infection of 13 people centered around a local hospital was discovered recently. The cluster was claimed to be China’s first case of locally transmitted COVID-19 in over two months. The

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In the midst of viral panic, everybody ignores the problem of false positives, and they call for more tests

medical worker about to swab inside somebody's mouth
Health and Safety 
Phillip Charlier 1 Comment , , ,

To get a more complete picture of how widespread the virus is in the United States, “we’re going to need millions and millions and millions of tests,” said Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases in Bethesda, Md., during a CNN town hall on March 5, reported Science News. Yesterday, March 18, Taiwan reported a record daily number of “confirmed cases” of Covid-19 at 23, bringing the total number of confirmed cases to 100. Eleven

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