Please only get a covid test if you have covid symptoms.

[Bluewavescrashing]

Only 3 symptoms indicate the need for covid testing.
Persistent or continuous dry cough
Fever
Loss of taste and / or smell.

If you have a cold, you do not need a covid test.
If you have a sore throat - no test.
Vomiting or stomach pain - no test.
Carry on going to work, kids to school or nursery as long as you are well enough to do so.

Please don't waste tests which are on short supply.

But the current rules ignore two of the three most common symptoms in children!

Based on what analysis? Where is the large scale data that demonstrates that?

@TheKeatingFive

But the current rules ignore two of the three most common symptoms in children!

Based on what analysis? Where is the large scale data that demonstrates that?

The Zoe app has been conducting nationwide research since the start, at Imperial I think.

@LilyPond2

It is for you to follow measures that are designed to pick up as many cases as possible whilst not running out of tests completely. But the current rules ignore two of the three most common symptoms in children!

What’s your point? Common symptoms according to whom? Where is the evidence for this? And even if this is true, makes no difference. We can’t know what the strategy is behind testing, capacity etc. Maybe it is only designed to pick up a % if cases - to curb the numbers as much as possible while not having to pay for a huge capacity and the resource and infrastructure needed to administer hundreds of thousands of tests a day would need. I agree this government are fucking incompetent. But the point is, WE cannot say that WE know any better than they do - or their scientific advisors.

So in the absence of anything better, just follow the guidance.

The Zoe app has been conducting nationwide research since the start, at Imperial I think.

And has it conclusively demonstrated, with peer reviewed data, that the two most common symptoms in children are not included in the criteria?

You can see why it's difficult to add fatigue, though. It's so subjective. My mum is insistent she's been fatigued since 1986.

So in the absence of anything better, just follow the guidance.

Exactly

www.google.co.uk/amp/s/inews.co.uk/news/health/covid-symptoms-children-coronavirus-signs-kids-nhs-advice-diarrhoea-vomiting-634279/amp

This summarises the findings in a large scale study TheKeatingFive

I don't know if it's too early to have data on English school children testing but isn't the positivity rate for Scottish children extremely low

I'm sure this is being done, does anyone know if we can find out data on reason for getting a test versus result of test.

The overall positivity rate although rising is still low, we need a way to stop unnecessary testing and fast track results for the symptoms we can prove are most likely to detect a postive case.

I agree with you @Bluewavescrashing if MN is at all representative of the overall population too many are going for tests without the specified symptoms and ignoring the scientific data on where and why cases are rising

The answer is that we need enough tests to be available, not for people being made to feel bad for getting tested. Plus a load of people who get it don't even get any symptoms so to restrict it to those with specific symptoms doesn't help!

@LilyPond2

Far too many armchair virologists about for my liking. Deciding that based on their wide sample size of TWO that they are free to interpret whatever symptom they like as being a need for a Covid test. I am going by: the Zoe study which to the best of my knowledge has the largest sample size of any study the WHO the advice given by the health authorities in various developed European countries with much lower death rates than the UK (not that that narrows the field much).

The UK took ages to add loss of smell as a test symptom. Presumably in the week before it did so, lots of the posters on here would have been asserting that loss of smell wasn't a Covid symptom because The Roolz said it wasn't, and that anyone getting tested for loss of smell was wasting resources.

I’m not saying that the rules aren’t bollocks. They may well. But if nobody follows them, and we have people getting tests for whatever the hell they think Covid presents as that week, we have bedlam. We have a chaos of people getting tested that don’t need to, and people needing to be tested that can’t. To reiterate the point again - none of us know the strategy (if there is one) behind all of this. So everyone at least sticking to the same rules HAS to be better than everyone doing what they damn well like.

@TheKeatingFive

The Zoe app has been conducting nationwide research since the start, at Imperial I think.

And has it conclusively demonstrated, with peer reviewed data, that the two most common symptoms in children are not included in the criteria?

The Zoe app is research. Not reviewed scientific evidence. Very different things.

@TheKeatingFive

The Zoe app has been conducting nationwide research since the start, at Imperial I think.

And has it conclusively demonstrated, with peer reviewed data, that the two most common symptoms in children are not included in the criteria?

Sorry it is not Imperial:

This research is led by Dr Tim Spector, professor of genetic epidemiology at King’s College London

This summarises the findings in a large scale study

With under 200 positive participants, I wouldn’t have thought they was anything close to a large enough sample to influence government policy.

It's not that long ago the government advice was to get a test if you felt unwell with any symptoms. They're useless.

@ButteryPuffin

The answer is that we need enough tests to be available, not for people being made to feel bad for getting tested. Plus a load of people who get it don't even get any symptoms so to restrict it to those with specific symptoms doesn't help!

But wishing doesn’t make it so. So until there are more tests available - follow the guidance on testing.

I agree but I know someone who had their child tested with only cold symptoms. Very frustrating.

TheKeatingFive

If you advance search my posts, I linked to a study discussed on Inside Science a while ago.
That was another study IIRC.

I don’t think the government have a bloody clue tbh.

If you actually give a shit join the zoe covid app and take 30 seconds to report every day. If you dont feel normal report the symptoms you do have, whatever they are. They will email to suggest you get a test. This will help the authorities refine their list of symptoms for covid.

It's a helpful thing you can do for yourself, for science and for society.

@Redcups64

That’s a load of rubbish! MOST (but not all colds) include a high temperature in young children, like mine, so even though I know it’s a cold she HAAS to have a test because she had a high temperature...due to a cold, but cannot go back to school until she has a test....for her cold.

I’m not panicking, but cold symptoms like fever or continuous cough that you have to be tested for just happen to be the same styptoms of Covid. So yes....you do have to be tested for a cold really!

Same here. My son has a nasty cold- snotty, sneezing etc but also had a high temp. I had to get him a test to rule out Covid (and drove 80miles return trip for it). It's ludicrous.

I know that when it comes to Covid we're supposed to not care about any of the cost-benefit analyses that we use for literally every other disease, but it does seem like maybe testing endless worried well people isn't actually a great use of public resources

"You can see why it's difficult to add fatigue, though. It's so subjective. My mum is insistent she's been fatigued since 1986."

I like this about the zoe app. It asks if you feel normal not if you feel well. Fatigue is normal for your mum.

@luckylavender

It's not that long ago the government advice was to get a test if you felt unwell with any symptoms. They're useless.

Why is it useless to revise the approach in the light of more and more data, that doesn't make any sense. Why would anyone still be tackling the virus in the same way that they did in February

Any government absolutely should keep its advice up to date

@Hardbackwriter

I know that when it comes to Covid we're supposed to not care about any of the cost-benefit analyses that we use for literally every other disease, but it does seem like maybe testing endless worried well people isn't actually a great use of public resources

This

We're on our way to the testing centre, no symptoms but DP has surgery on Tuesday and needs a clear test before he can be admitted. The hospital his surgery is at is over an hour away so we are going to our local test centre.

@NellNorth

What if you’re self employed? No sick pay, no compensation? My husband has been out of work for months because lockdown killed his business. He has work now, and we have debts to pay, as well as four children to feed. He would go for a test rather than self isolate. We have no saving left. He works or we go hungry and lose our home.

So sorry to hEar that I am more concerned with these type of stories than the virus to be honest !