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Has anyone been temperature tested in a public place and found a high temperature?

35 replies

Scales2020 · 18/12/2020 23:15

I'm just wondering if there's any point really. You never hear of either staff, or people tested, reporting they thought they were fine and had their temperature taken and found they had COVID that way.

It seems like a waste of time if not!

OP posts:
Dadnotamum72 · 18/12/2020 23:32

Need someone that has been taking others temperatures to answer but agree seems a waste of time.

JingleJohnsJulie · 18/12/2020 23:51

I haven't heard of this happening to anyone either.

Bingowin · 18/12/2020 23:53

The thing is,if you have a temperature you feel too rough to be out and about anyway! You certainly know about it surely?

BikeRunSki · 18/12/2020 23:55

Those forehead thermometer guns always seem to put me at around 32 degrees anyway. Not sure they are hugely accurate. I have to take my temp most days (construction site).

HighHeelBoots · 18/12/2020 23:56

I had a high temp from walking up a hill. They waited a bit then did it again and I was fine
Last week my temp was taken and I was told it was so low I should really be deadXmas Grin it was cold and I wasn't wearing a coat

bunwell · 18/12/2020 23:57

I asked a temperature taker this yesterday in an outside queue. She said they hadn’t had to refuse a single person so fat out of thousands.

I have been testing my own temperature as lots of hot flushes. It does really go up a lot in the midst of one and I am concerned I may be turned away mid flush.

Saltn · 18/12/2020 23:58

I regularly have a temp according to those things. I have to take it as work and often have to stand outside for a few minutes and try again.

helloxhristmas · 19/12/2020 00:02

I'm dead by hospital appointment guns, read 30, totally agree with you op

Haenow · 19/12/2020 00:02

They’re ridiculously inaccurate. People hold them too far away.
Some of the low temps I’ve been recorded as having would indicate I’m unwell enough to be requiring urgent medical care as opposed to being able to sit in the hairdressers!

backinthebox · 19/12/2020 00:08

I have been found to have a high temperature twice. Once recently on a work trip abroad where I had a negative Covid test before flying. My temperature was high on landing. I had another Covid test at the airport and that came back negative too. Then another high temperature yesterday when I went to the dentist. I’d had a Covid test at the weekend (negative) and then 3 days self isolating in order to allow me to have a minor procedure in hospital, then went to the dentist next day. They ask you to call the surgery and wait in your car for them to call you inside. It was sunny and warm - my right side of my forehead was hot, the left side acceptable temperature. They sent me on my way anyway, and made me another appointment for next year, which is annoying as I’m half way through having a crown rebuilt. I do understand they have to have a line in the sand though.

Fwiw the government doesn’t advise relying on taking temperatures to check if someone is covidy or not. www.gov.uk/government/news/dont-rely-on-temperature-screening-products-for-detection-of-coronavirus-covid-19-says-mhra

CatVsChristmasTree · 19/12/2020 00:36

GP surgery. We had a few over the summer, receptionists panicked, I came out with the ear one and confirmed my assumption that it was standing in the heat, that gave them hot foreheads.
As PPs have said, everyone is hypothermic on them now as it's cold. So potentially masking any actual fevers. They are useless. Especially as people hold them too far away.
Used them on a fancy private ward during my training and they were constantly being sent away to repairs for reading wrong. So dangerous to use them in actual health care.

LassFromLeedsWithALustForLife · 19/12/2020 00:40

I had a high temperature at the GPs when they tested me, because I had an ear infection. Had to argue that yes, I know I have a high temperature, I’ve got raging earache, that’s why the doctor has advised me to come in over the phone. The woman doing the radar gunning kept parroting back that anyone with a temperature of more than 37.8 needed to have a Covid test and couldn’t come inside. GP ended up coming outside to see me and I had a ruptured eardrum. Once this has been established they did let me inside.

Fastnfurriest · 19/12/2020 00:47

The man in front of us wasn't let into the Apple store because his temp read too high.

GachaBread · 19/12/2020 01:10

Son had a dental appointment for excruciating pain, temp taken- temp too high, waited 5 minutes temp taken again temp read something else that was still too high. Was told could not been seen and would have to rebook for two weeks.
I tried to reason with the gatekeeper that the pain and the problem was in fact causing the high temperature but to no avail.
2 more nights my son managed to hold on for before literally crying his heart out. Pain relief was not working no longer.
Cut a long story short I paid private for a dentist that miraculously did not use the scanners and voila problem solved.
I guess money talks!

StatisticalSense · 19/12/2020 01:35

Plenty of people were found to have a high temperature on a first reading on the crappy ones we were using at work (hospitality so currently closed), many of the same people would then go on to supposedly be hypothermic 15 minutes later (or in a couple of cases immediately afterwards using a different identical thermometer). Others would routinely get a reading that simply came out as 'low' as they were supposedly a temperature below the minimum that the thermometer could 'accurately' measure.
We found that essentially having the heating on in the car or wearing a hat immediately prior to being tested (other than a cap) would usually be sufficient to lead to a high reading.

SleepingStandingUp · 19/12/2020 01:36

Last time I was tested in public temp was about 35°C.

notangelinajolie · 19/12/2020 01:50

No, but I'm off to the hairdressers tomorrow and seriously considering taking a couple of paracetamol before I go. The past few times I've been they have shoved a thermometer on my forehead before I've even got through the door
And no - I don't have a cough, fever or loss of taste. I do however tend to naturally have a temperature on the higher end of the scale and get hot when I'm wrapped up for winter weather with my coat and mask on.

UpToMyElbowsInDiapers · 19/12/2020 01:54

A 24-year-old at my DH’s office had a slightly temp high reading a few weeks ago. He had no other symptoms, felt a-ok, and no known exposures. He was sent home anyway to get tested. Positive result, admitted to hospital a few days later needing oxygen.

Obviously one anecdote can’t prove this is an effective screening tool, but I’m mightily glad it was taken seriously in that instance and the guy didn’t spend the day with DH!

garlictwist · 19/12/2020 02:08

Husband who had covid tested his own temperature the morning he got his positive result and it was normal. So it's not exactly a fail safe.

PrimeraVez · 19/12/2020 02:10

I’m in fine Middle East and at school pick up a few months ago, a whole bunch of mums got sent away. They’d been waiting at the school gates and at that time of year, the temperature is around 40 degrees, so obviously they were all hot!

School quickly put up a load of gazebos with outside AC units for us to wait under!

Hardbackwriter · 19/12/2020 02:50

DS's nursery take their temperature every morning before they go in, I had long suspected it was pointless theatre, confirmed when I heard DS's keyworker say 'oh, 30, that's perfect DS!' Confused

beckypv · 19/12/2020 08:11

I think they are notorious for giving low readings. My son was scanned before going into a&e, and I said “well he won’t pass that, that why we are here”. The guy at the door said don’t worry.... took it and it read 36. Once we were admitted it was 39 pretty consistently!!! I think the forehead ones are used as a deterrent to ill people rather than to actually catch them.

cliffdiver · 19/12/2020 08:15

You need to add about 2/3°c to those forehead scanner ones, so if you had a fever that was feverish enough to be picked up then you probably wouldn't feel well enough to go out.

Helenluvsrob · 19/12/2020 08:16

It’s worse than pointless.
The device and person need to be in the same place indoors for a time maybe 10 mins I can’t remember , for the reading to be valid any way.

insancerre · 19/12/2020 08:24

At my nursery we have to take the children’s temperatures three times a day, staff too
We have had a few high readings of the children’s temps and have sent them home to be tested
They have all been negative
If any of the staff read high, we wait a few minutes then retest and it usually comes down to normal
We did have one staff member who tested negative after one high reading, she had to be off for a few days while she waited for her result
I think it’s a complete waste of time, taking temperatures

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