- I appreciate this isn't hard evidence but it's the argument I use:
I believe that's why you're only supposed to get tested with symptoms.
A nurse friend who's father was a research dr at Oxford and managed setting up labs etc, including coordinating the nightingales, said told me pcr tests have been around for years and are the best current guide. I believe it's fairly accepted that you get false positives and negatives in medicine; the key is treating. It's accurate enough to be the best guide we have.
So with infectious diseases such as scarlet fever you give the ABs to be safe then send of the test. So you isolate to be safe and potentially stop spread.
That's also why they're focussing so much on loss of smell as a key symptom.
It's splitting hairs to go down the false positive negative route and a bit irrelevant. It's also why hospitalisations are key to this. You look at the bigger picture.
He is therefore concerned that these lockdowns will become the accepted way of dealing with any virus of this kind in future, whether they work or not.
No govt in their right mind would do a lockdown unless it were really necessary. The economy is fucked. I don't think the tories will recover either.