Does anyone else keep getting asked to test by Zoe?

[WildSkitty]

I'm part of the Zoe app and complete the symptom checker as often as I remember (usually 3-4 times a week).

Usually I answer that I'm feeling fine, but every time I've said that I don't feel fine, even with non classic covid symptoms (headache, tiredness), it has suggested I do a test. I've now done 3 tests.

Is it normal to be sent for so many tests?

Yes, twice. Both times when I reported bowel issues. However, I have IBS so I wouldn’t regard that as a Covid symptom in my case. I took the test first time asked but not the second.

I have multiple health problems. So " I feel phynormal" can still mean I'm feeling crap. However every time I have said there was anything wrong it wants me to have a test. I don't want to waste valuable resources on a test I know is unnecessary.

I remember I got asked to go for a test and it said they are asking people with certain combinations of symptoms which they do not think are COVID to get tested, I presume to add evidence to their research that sneezing, for example, isn’t usually a symptom.

As others have said, it's research. So if they test 1000 people who report headaches, and none of them have covid, then they can extrapolate that a headache alone doesn't suggest people have covid.

If they test 1000 people with a rash and 500 of them have covid, that means that rashes should be viewed with suspicion.

This was how they alerted that loss of taste/smell was a risk.

So it's not an unneccessary test, even if you don't meet the normal criteria to be tested. It's just that the benefit of it is a research benefit. It's sufficiently of benefit that the Department of Health has agreed that those identified by Zoe can and should be tested, outside of the normal symptom pattern.

Remember they were one of the main players who discovered that loss of taste was a symptom

To the best of my recollection, that was being widely reported as a symptom well before the app was in wide use - around the time it was launched in fact. It just wasn’t an ‘official’ PHE symptom...what’s the source for them ‘discovering’ this?

As I understand it, discovered is overstating it. But their research was one of the pieces of evidence that alerted PHE that they needed to list it as a symptom. covid.joinzoe.com/post/uk-anosmia-covid

Further info at covid.joinzoe.com/post/covid-donations, where they say "Proving new symptoms: Our research proved that the loss of smell is a major symptom of COVID. The research was published in Nature Medicine and the UK government (finally) added it to their lists of symptoms on the 18th May‍"

Well I feel slightly better now for getting tested again if it's helpful in some way. I do feel that it's a slight waste of resources if I'm being asked to test to prove that it will be negative as that takes a place from someone who might actually be positive and really need a test

I do feel that it's a slight waste of resources if I'm being asked to test to prove that it will be negative

You need to read the thread, and the website - you're missing the point. Tests that prove negative are intrinsic to the research.

Re-read the thread, is what I meant.