Category: Covid-19

Large-scale, national efforts to utilize technology in support of remote learning, distance education and online learning during the COVID-19 pandemic are emerging and evolving quickly.

This page attempts to curate useful resources and publish related documents collected and prepared by the World Bank's edtech team in support of national dialogues with policymakers around the world. Other institutions are welcome to redistribute any of what appears below.Updates are frequently posted on this page.

BRIEFING NOTES AND RESOURCE LISTS

Guidance Note: Remote Learning & COVID-19 (pdf, last draft 7 April 2020)A short 3-page guidance noteoffers principles to maximize countries effectiveness in designing and executing remote learning.

Rapid response reference note: Remote Learning and COVID-19 (pdf, last draft 20 March 2020)A 12-page rapid response reference note prepared to help brief policymakers on some general rules of thumb of potential relevance when very quickly exploring and rolling out the use of remote learning, distance education and online learning at scale.

Remote Learning, Distance Education and Online Learning During the COVID-19 Pandemic: A Resource List (pdf, last draft 10 April)The selection of resources and platforms that you will find here has been curated to facilitate the rapid identification of helpful technological solutions that could be used to support remote learning. The resource list is regularly curated and organized by the World Bank's Edtech team.

Rapid Response Guidance Note: Educational Television & COVID-19 (pdf, last draft 17 April)Five things to do, and five thigns to consider, when rolling out educational TV programmes while schools are closed as a result of COVID-19.

- - - - - - - -

EDTECH & COVID-19 RESOURCES FROM PARTNER INSTITUTIONS

Many partner organizations are rapidly trying to curate and make available related infomation, as well as share guidance and documentation that they themselves are generating, including the EdTech Hub,UNESCO,mEducation Alliance,Learning Keeps Going (U.S. consortium), INEE(Inter-Agency Network for Education in Emergencies),Commonwealth of Learning, and many others.

EDTECH HUB RESOURCES

The EdTech Hub, a joint initiative of Dfid, the World Bank and the Gates Foundation, is developing and sharing many reports and knowledge resources related to the use of edtech during the COVID-19 pandemic, including:

- - - - - - - -

From the World Bank document library: Educational radio

While not designed for a COVID-19 operaitng context, a number of countries are finding that much of the contnt in the following two documents, produced with EDC, is 'evergreen', and thus applicable today:

- - - - - - - -

Relevant past posts from the World Bank EduTech Blog archive

While written prior to the COVID-19 outbreak, many posts from the Bank's EduTech blog explore topics and implementation models of potential relevance. Here are a few of them:

Education & Technology in an Age of Pandemics (revisited)The use of educational technologies at scale in response to disease outbreaks pre-dates the current COVID-19 pandemic; recent past experiences occurred as a result of outbreaks related to SARS, H1N1 and Ebola as well.

Zero-rating educational content on the InternetIn some countries, learners can access educational web sites and use educational apps at no cost because the resources are 'zero rated', i.e. data charges don't apply when accessing them.

Universal Service Funds & connecting schools to the Internet around the worldMany countries are tapping so-called 'universal service funds' to quickly pay for expanding connectivity to learners at home. Here's some related background on the use of such funds in education.

The promise and the challenges of virtual schoolsAs a result of the coronavirus, many schools have quickly become 'virtual'. Much is known about what works, and what doesn't, when it comes to 'virtual schooling'.

Complexities in utilizing free digital learning resourcesMany countries are trying to quickly provide access to digital learning content from multiple sources. Some of these are free 'open educational resources', others are provided by publishers, private companies and non-profit groups, while in yet other cases governments are quickly digitizing existing content and putting it online. This posts looks at a three-step process for doing this.

Digital teaching and learning resources: An EduTech readerA consolidated collection of posts of potential relevance to decisionmakers quickly considering the use of online learning content.

The Matthew Effect in Educational TechnologyWhile the use of educational technologies are often touted for their ability to close the 'digital divide' and to 'open up geater possiblilties for all learners', in practice the opposite often occurs. Unless care is taken, edtech brings with it often profound challenges related to equity.

Bad practices in mobile learningBelieving that, in the short term, the best technologies are usually the ones people already have, know how to use, and can afford, many countries are astutely trying to make available learning and learning support materials for use on mobile phones. When doing so, there are a number of things that should be avoided.

Interactive Radio Instruction : A Successful Permanent Pilot Project?Especially where students don't have other technologies at home, educational radio can be an effective means of reaching leaners at scale when schools are closed. While originally designed to support low capacity or untrained teachers in the classroom, so-called interactive radio instruction can also be helpful when teaching at home is coordinated by parents or other caregivers.

10 principles to consider when introducing ICTs into remote, low-income educational environmentsWhen planning for the use of educational technologies to reach learners in some of the most challenging circumstances, it can be useful to formulate a set of principles to guide related decisions. Here are a few for consideration.

Last Updated:Apr 27, 2020

See the original post here:

Remote Learning, EdTech & COVID-19 - worldbank.org

A nurse at the Veterans Affairs Medical Center in Manhattan holds a cellphone last month so a COVID-19 patient can see and listen to his family. Robert Nickelsberg/Getty Images hide caption

A nurse at the Veterans Affairs Medical Center in Manhattan holds a cellphone last month so a COVID-19 patient can see and listen to his family.

COVID-19 has given ventilators an undeservedly bad reputation, says Dr. Colin Cooke, an associate professor of medicine in the division of pulmonary and critical care at the University of Michigan.

"It's always disheartening to know that some people are out there saying if you end up on a ventilator it's a death sentence, which is not what we are experiencing and I don't think it's what the data are showing," Cooke says.

Early reports from China, the United Kingdom and Seattle found mortality rates as high as 90% among patients on ventilators. And more recently, a study of some New York hospitals seemed to show a mortality rate of 88%.

But Cooke and others say the New York figure was misleading because the analysis included only patients who had either died or been discharged. "So folks who were actually in the midst of fighting their illness were not being included in the statistic of patients who were still alive," he says.

Those patients made up more than half of all the people in the study.

And Cooke suspects that many of them will survive.

"We think that mortality for folks that end up on the ventilator with [COVID-19] is going to end up being somewhere between probably 25% up to maybe 50%," Cooke says.

Scary, but hardly a death sentence.

There's also some encouraging news from a New York health system that cares for people with risk factors that make them much more likely to die from COVID-19

Montefiore Health System in the Bronx serves a low-income population with high rates of diabetes, obesity and other health problems. And in April, it faced an onslaught of sick people with COVID-19.

"The number of patients with critical care needs was more than triple the normal levels," says Dr. Michelle Ng Gong, chief of critical care medicine at Montefiore and a professor at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine.

To cope, regular hospital wards became intensive care units, critical care teams worked extra shifts, and heart doctors found themselves caring for lung patients.

Weeks later, it's still too soon to calculate mortality rates precisely, Gong says. "We still have a large number of patients on mechanical ventilation in our intensive care unit," she says. "So the outcomes of those patients is still uncertain."

But Gong adds that when it comes to COVID-19 patients on ventilators, "We win more than we lose."

That's especially good news coming from a city where hospitals faced so many challenges, says Dr. Todd Rice, who directs the medical intensive care unit at Vanderbilt University Medical Center in Nashville, Tenn.

"They were having to care for patients in makeshift ICUs [with] doctors who weren't their normal ICU doctors," Rice says. "That probably results in some worse outcomes."

So far, Vanderbilt has been able to keep COVID-19 patients on ventilators in existing ICUs with experienced intensive care teams, Rice says. And the mortality rate "is in the mid-to-high 20% range," he says.

That's only a bit higher than the death rate for patients placed on ventilators with severe lung infections unrelated to the coronavirus.

And, like many other intensive care specialists, Rice says he thinks COVID-19 will turn out to be less deadly than the early numbers suggested.

"I think overall these mortality rates are going to be higher than we're used to seeing but not dramatically higher," he says.

Preliminary data from Emory University in Atlanta support that prediction.

The mortality rate among 165 COVID-19 patients placed on a ventilator at Emory was just under 30%. And unlike the New York study, only a few patients were still on a ventilator when the data were collected.

Factors that may have kept death rates low include careful planning and no shortages of equipment or personnel, says Dr. Craig Coopersmith, who directs the critical care center at Emory. But the care largely followed existing protocols for patients with life-threatening lung infections, he says.

"There is no secret magic that can't be replicated in other places," Coopersmith says. "And I do believe that we will see a global trend toward better outcomes on the ventilator and in the intensive care unit."

Also, intensive care doctors say ICU teams are becoming more skilled at treating COVID-19 patients as they gain experience with the disease. For example, they are doing more to prevent dangerous blood clots from forming.

That means COVID-19 mortality rates in ICUs are likely to decrease over time, Coopersmith says.

"It's still going to be a devastating disease," he says, "but a more manageable devastating disease."

Continue reading here:

Ventilator Survival Rates For COVID-19 Appear Higher Than First Thought : Shots - Health News - NPR

Everlywell was one of the first startups to announce that it was working on a self-administered, at-home COVID-19 diagnostic kit, but it initially sought out to ship kits before regulators made clear that this was not in line with its guidelines. Everlywell then became intent on working with the FDA to secure a proper Emergency Use Authorization for its kits before sending any to consumers, and that approach has paid off with the U.S. drug regulator issuing an EUA for Everlywells tech today.

Everlywells COVID-19 Test Home Collection Kit is the first standalone sample collection kit to be granted a proper EUA by the FDA. Other kits have been in use through physician-prescribed and directed collection, and others still have been authorized specifically for use with one test (where provider of both kit and test are the same). This approval is unique because Everlywell is offering its sample kit independent of any specific testing lab, and can work with a variety of labs to potentially provide a broader testing footprint.

The test kits are then sent to one of two labs currently authorized under separate EUAs for COVID-19 testing, and the administration notes that this could expand to other test providers in future should they file for an EUA and provide the requisite data that goes along with the verification required for that emergency approval. The FDA cites Everlywells work in collecting and presenting data from studies including those supported by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation to show that samples collected at home using its nasal swab collection method remain stable during shipping.

That data is also now available to others looking to provide similar test kit offerings, the FDA notes, which should reduce the burden of proof on anyone looking to gain authorization for a competing product. That could potentially open up testing even further, reducing a bottleneck that many public health professionals see as one of the key drivers of a successful recovery.

The authorization of a COVID-19 at-home collection kit that can be used with multiple tests at multiple labs not only provides increased patient access to tests, but also protects others from potential exposure, said Jeffrey Shuren, M.D., J.D., director of the FDAs Center for Devices and Radiological Health in a statement provided to TechCrunch. Todays action is also another great example of public-private partnerships in which data from a privately funded study was used by industry to support an EUA request, saving precious time as we continue our fight against this pandemic.

Continue reading here:

Everlywell gains first FDA authorization for a standalone, at-home, COVID-19 test sample collection kit - TechCrunch

Phil Drake, Great Falls Tribune Published 10:21 a.m. MT May 16, 2020 | Updated 11:34 a.m. MT May 16, 2020

Yellowstone County has reported two new COVID-19 cases, bringing the states total to 468, officials said Saturday.

The new cases involve a woman in her 70s and a male under 19, according to the states covid19.mt.gov website.

Coronavirus.(Photo: Claudia Saveedra and Getty Images)

The state reports that 431 of confirmed reports have recovered and 21 remain active. Three peopleremain hospitalized out of 63 hospitalizations. The state has reported 16 deaths from the respiratory illness.

The state said it has completed 26,091 tests, which is 673 more than Friday.

The state reported Saturday that Montana has had 468 confirmed cases of COVID-19. Of those, 431 have recovered and 21 are active.(Photo: COVID19.MT.GOV)

Cascade County, which at one time had 17 confirmed reports and two deaths, has one active case. Toole County, which has had 29 reports and six deaths, now has two active cases, the state reported.

Yellowstone County now has five active cases, Big Horn County has six active cases.

Four confirmed cases of COVID-19 were reported Friday in Big Horn County. The Crow Tribe Incident Response Center posted on its Facebook page early Friday that seven of 44 COVID-19 tests by Indian Health Service have been positive, with one case pending.They note there havebeen eight confirmed cases in Big Horn County.

The Crow Indian Reservationhas extended its stay-at-home order, which was to expire May 14, until June 15 to curtail the spread of COVID-19 and has received more than $25 million in coronavirus relief aid.

Also on Friday, Gov. Steve Bullock visited a drive-thru testing site at the Fort Belknap Agency. That testing was to continue Saturday.

Elsewhere in the state, gyms, movie theaters and museums reopened Friday under Bullocksphased plan.Like restaurants and other businesses that were previously allowed to open under the phased reopening, gyms, theaters and museums will have to limit capacity, enforce social distancing and adhere to sanitation requirements.

Bullock on Wednesday said it was premature to make budget cuts and described Montanas fiscal condition as historically strong heading into the COVID-19 pandemic. He said the state entered into Fiscal Year 2020 with an unobligated general fund ending balance of more than $360 million.

The Budget Office will know more about the budget picture when income tax revenues are received in July, he said.

Bullocksaid the state is not in a position to make unnecessary, across-the-board cuts to essential services ones that Montanans are relying on more than ever during this pandemic.

Bullocksaid Montana, like other states, is starting to see revenue declines and that the Budget Office and state agencies are taking steps to save on expenditures and offset revenue reductions.

The state Legislative Revenue Interim Committee, made up of six Republicans and six Democrats, is expected to review aproposed letterto the governor at its May 20 meeting. The draft askshim to reduce current state spending, saying it could ward off significant budget cuts in the 2021 legislative session.

Bullock saidhe is managing our state budget on the basis of data, informed projections and fact, not politics.

In terms of other help, the state website covidrelief.mt.govfeatures nine programs and $123 million inCoronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES)Act funds to help Montanans with recovery.

Also, $10 million in CARES Act funding is now available to Montana child care providers to continue serving families with essential workers and helpwith efforts to reopen after closing due to COVID-19.

For more information, go tobestbeginnings.mt.gov.

Other than covid19.mt.gov, people can also visitwww.dphhs.mt.govfor updated health information.

For mental health support, the Warmline is available at 877-688-3377 ormontanawarmline.org.

Reporter Phil Drake is our eye on the state capitol. For tips, suggestions or comment, he can be reached at 406-231-9021 or pdrake@greatfallstribune.com. To support his work, subscribe today and get a special offer.

Read or Share this story: https://www.greatfallstribune.com/story/news/2020/05/16/2-new-cases-covid-19-reported-saturday-montana/5205837002/

Read the original post:

2 new cases of COVID-19 reported Saturday in Montana - Great Falls Tribune

Michigan's death toll from the novel coronavirus reached 4,880 on Saturday after the state added 55 deathsto its count.

The state also confirmed 425 new cases of the illness COVID-19, bringing its cumulative total cases to 50,500, according to state data.

The number of deaths is an increase from Friday when the state recorded 38 new deaths. There was, however, a delay from the state in reporting and the deaths may not have occurred from Friday.

An electronic billboard in downtown Lansing encourages residents to "stay home" amid the COVID-19 pandemic.(Photo: Craig Mauger / The Detroit News)

The number of confirmed COVID-19 cases in Michigan exceeded 50,000this week, but daily reports of new deaths have slowed in recent days.

In the last seven days, the state has reported 432 new deaths, down from 527 new deaths during the week prior. Two weeks earlier, April 25 through May 1, the state reported 781 new deaths.

Detroit's Chief Public Health Officer Denise Fair said there were two deaths in the cityaccounted for Friday and data remains fluid as state and local hospitals review and update death records attributable to COVID-19.

"Our overall week-to-week trend is continuing in the right direction," Fair said in a statement Saturday.

Detroit added 675 cases in the past week, 92 cases from Friday,bringing the total of cases to 10,351 on Saturday.

The city's death toll reached 1,257,adding 44 deaths in the past seven days showcasing adecline in deaths from the week prior, according to the city's data.

The newest data on COVID-19 testing in Michigan available showed a spike in testing on Wednesday. The state reported 23,647 tests performed Wednesday, the most in a single day yet.

According to the state's numbers, 10.7% of the tests returned positive results. Michigan had previously reported 12 straight days with less than 10% of tests being positive. The state's overall fatality rate is 10% with the average age of victims being 75 years old.

Michigan continued Friday to rank seventh nationally for the number of cases and fourth for the number of deaths, according to tracking by Johns Hopkins University. In deaths, Michigan was behind New York, New Jersey and Massachusetts.

As of Friday, 28,234 Michigan residents were considered "recovered" from COVID-19, meaning they were still alive 30 days after the onset of illness. The department doesn't have data on recoveries by county.

"In the past seven days, we have lost 44 Detroiters to the virus, considerably less than 67 reported the previous seven days," Fair said."I applaud the unwavering spirit of Detroiters who are taking this crisis seriously by wearing their mask, social distancing and other precautions to beat COVID-19 in our community."

srahal@detroitnews.com

Twitter: @SarahRahal_

Read or Share this story: https://www.detroitnews.com/story/news/local/michigan/2020/05/16/michigan-detroit-covid-19-cases-continuing-right-direction/5201706002/

View post:

Michigan, Detroit COVID-19 cases 'continuing in the right direction' - The Detroit News

It is a risk; youre not going to be physically distant, Remington said. But if customers wear masks and employees wears masks and possibly face shields, and both parties clean their hands before and after, the risk will be lower, he and Safdar said.

Knowing how much community transmission of COVID-19 is occurring can help, Remington said. Get your hair cut during a lull, he said.

Hair salons aren't known to be major sources of coronavirus transmission, but that could change, Safdar said. There may be clusters that will only become apparent when the salons open up, she said.

If my gym reopens, should I exercise there?

Gyms that have robust cleaning, good ventilation, physical distancing space, use of masks and good sick leave policies will be safest, the doctors said.

Olderadults and people with chronic conditions should probably avoid gyms, Safdar said. Exercising outdoors is a lower-risk alternative, Remington said.

What about traveling within Wisconsin or to another state?

Car travel is OK if drive-thru restaurants are available and hotels, if needed, are well cleaned, Safdar said. Bring wipes for additional cleaning, she said.

Airplanes can be risky even if middle seats are empty and people wear masks, she said. Youre in close quarters with a large group of people, potentially for several hours, she said. You dont know who might be incubating COVID.

See original here:

With COVID-19 rules relaxing, what activities are safe? Here's a FAQ - Madison.com

Monday was a day of triumph for Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern. Thanks to the efforts of the entire nation, she said, New Zealand had been largely successful in meeting its ambitious goal of eradicating, rather than just controlling, outbreaks of Covid-19. The lockdown she had put in place on March 25 could now end.

Ms. Arderns success is the latest data point in a widely noticed trend: Countries led by women seem to be particularly successful in fighting the coronavirus.

Germany, led by Angela Merkel, has had a far lower death rate than Britain, France, Italy or Spain. Finland, where Prime minister Sanna Marin, 34, governs with a coalition of four female-led parties, has had fewer than 10 percent as many deaths as nearby Sweden. And Tsai Ing-wen, the president of Taiwan, has presided over one of the most successful efforts in the world at containing the virus, using testing, contact tracing and isolation measures to control infections without a full national lockdown.

We should resist drawing conclusions about women leaders from a few exceptional individuals acting in exceptional circumstances. But experts say that the womens success may still offer valuable lessons about what can help countries weather not just this crisis, but others in the future.

The rock band Van Halen famously included a clause in its tour rider that required venue managers to place bowls of M&Ms in their dressing room. But WARNING it said in underlined capital letters, ABSOLUTELY NO BROWN ONES.

The clauses true purpose had nothing to do with chocolate. Rather, it was an easy-to-spot signal of whether the venues managers had taken care to read and follow the entire set of instructions in the rider including the safety guidelines for the bands extremely complex sets and equipment.

Just as the absence of brown M&Ms signaled a careful, safe venue, the presence of a female leader may be a signal that a country has more inclusive political institutions and values.

Varied information sources, and leaders with the humility to listen to outside voices, are crucial for successful pandemic response, Devi Sridhar, the Chair of Global Health at the University of Edinburgh Medical School, wrote in an op-ed in the British Medical Journal. The only way to avoid groupthink and blind spots is to ensure representatives with diverse backgrounds and expertise are at the table when major decisions are made, she wrote.

Having a female leader is one signal that people of diverse backgrounds and thus, hopefully, diverse perspectives on how to combat crises are able to win seats at that table. In Germany, for instance, Ms. Merkels government considered a variety of different information sources in developing its coronavirus policy, including epidemiological models; data from medical providers; and evidence from South Koreas successful program of testing and isolation. As a result, the country has achieved a coronavirus death rate that is dramatically lower than those of other Western European countries.

By contrast, the male-led governments of Sweden and Britain both of which have high coronavirus death tolls appear to have relied primarily on epidemiological modeling by their own advisers, with few channels for dissent from outside experts.

However, a signal is not proof. And the surrounding political system can trump the different perspectives that a diverse group might bring to the issue.

When Ruth Carlitz, a political scientist at Tulane University, analyzed governors track records in the United States, she found that women were not quicker to impose lockdowns to fight the coronavirus. (Her analysis is recent and has not been peer-reviewed.)

That may be because any gender effect has been muffled by the all-consuming power of political partisanship. Dr. Carlitz found that Republican governors in the United States, male and female, took longer to impose stay-at-home orders than Democrats did.

After President Trump was criticized for failing to wear a mask during public appearances, David Marcus, a conservative journalist, argued in an article for the website The Federalist that Mr. Trump was projecting American strength. If Mr. Trump were to wear a mask, he wrote, that would signal that the United States is so powerless against this invisible enemy sprung from China that even its president must cower behind a mask.

Medical accessorizing is not usually seen as so crucial to great-power conflict. But Mr. Marcuss analysis is actually quite consistent with the traditional idea of a strong American leader: one who projects power, acts aggressively and above all shows no fear, thereby cowing the nations enemies into submission.

In other words, a strong leader is one who conforms to the swaggering ideals of masculinity.

That has often created difficulties for women in politics. There is an expectation that leaders should be aggressive and forward and domineering. But if women demonstrate those traits, then theyre seen as unfeminine, said Alice Evans, a sociologist at King's College London who studies how women gain power in public life. That makes it very difficult for women to thrive as leaders.

Ms. Arderns approach to fighting the pandemic could not be further from that traditional archetype. But on this new kind of crisis, her cautious leadership has proved successful. I would say that shutting down the economy early was a risk-averse strategy, Dr. Evans said. Because no one knew what was going to happen, so its the strategy to just protect life first.

After New Zealand began its lockdown on March 25, Ms. Ardern addressed the nation via a casual Facebook Live session she conducted on her phone after putting her toddler to bed. Dressed in a cozy-looking sweatshirt, she empathized with citizens anxieties and offered apologies to anyone who was startled or alarmed by the emergency alert that announced the lockdown order.

Theres no way to send out those emergency civil alerts on your phones with anything other than the loud honk that you heard, she said ruefully. That was actually something we all discussed: was there a way that we could send that message that wasnt so alarming?

By contrast, Mr. Trump has tried to anthropomorphize the virus into a foe he can rail against, calling it a brilliant enemy. But while that may have encouraged his base, it has not aided American efforts to contain the pandemic. The United States now has the highest coronavirus death toll in the world.

In Britain, Boris Johnson rose to power as a prominent Brexit backer, promising to play hardball to win the best deal in the countrys exit from the European Union. But the skills he used to battle Brussels bureaucrats turned out not to be useful in the fight against the pandemic. His government delayed lockdowns and other crucial protective measures like increasing testing capacity and ordering safety equipment for hospitals. Britains death toll is now the second-highest globally.

Male leaders can overcome gendered expectations, of course, and many have. But it may be less politically costly for women to do so because they do not have to violate perceived gender norms to adopt cautious, defensive policies.

That style of leadership may become increasingly valuable. As the consequences of climate change escalate, there will likely be more crises arising out of extreme weather and other natural disasters. Hurricanes and forest fires cannot be intimidated into surrender any more than the virus can. And neither can climate change itself.

Eventually that could change perceptions of what strong leadership looks like. What we learned with Covid is that, actually, a different kind of leader can be very beneficial, Dr. Evans said. Perhaps people will learn to recognize and value risk averse, caring and thoughtful leaders.

See the article here:

Why Are Women-Led Nations Doing Better With Covid-19? - The New York Times

The San Diego Union-Tribune reporter gets results from Covid-19 test

What have I gotten myself into? How bad is this going to hurt?

Those were some of my thoughts as I stood in line outside San Diego Countys North Inland Live Well Center in Escondido on May 7, waiting to get a coronavirus test. Ive seen videos of people claiming the tests felt like a stick had penetrated their brain, which left me a little nervous.

Publicly funded testing for the coronavirus in San Diego County had been reserved for people who had been referred to a testing site by a medical provider. That changed May 5 when new state-fund testing sites opened in Escondido, Grossmont College in El Cajon and at a closed Sears in Chula Vista.

Expanding tests to people without symptoms will be a way for the county to better track the spread of the virus, and the new sites together have a capacity of performing almost 800 tests daily.

The state contracted with Optum, which is part of UnitedHealth Group, to find 80 locations in California for the sites, and Optum has contracted with labs to get results from samples collected. The wait for results usually is 48 to 72 hours.

The countys announcement about signing up for the tests was described as three easy steps, but there reportedly were problems with the website and issues with scheduling on the first day.

Glitches supposedly had been worked out and were running smoother the day after it launched, which was when I made a reservation, but there still were some kinks. After logging into https://lhi.care/covidtesting and creating an account after proving I wasnt a robot, I filled out several pages asking about my employment, whether I lived or worked in a congregate living facility, had any COVID-like symptoms and other questions.

The site also asks for insurance information because the insurer will be billed at the Medicare rate, though the person getting the test is not supposed to be charged a copay or any out-of-pocket expense under a government rule.

Filling out the questions took a few minutes, and then things got more frustrating.

After putting in my zip code to find the nearest testing site, all of the locations I was given were in Orange County. I was in Oceanside, and Escondido was just 15 miles away, but the website directed me to a location in San Juan Capistrano.

I changed my home location to an El Cajon zip code and set the search function to 50 miles, but got a message that there were no locations within that distance, which wasnt true as there is one in Grossmont College.

After a few experiments like that, the Chula Vista and Escondido sites suddenly popped up, but I couldnt book an appointment because the entire month of May was grayed out.

One page said the Escondido site had an opening on May 7, but when I selected it, the calendar still was grayed out so I couldnt make an appointment. I checked again later and the calendar did work, but the opening now was in about 30 minutes, much too soon to make.

By then I had called (888) 634-1123, the number to make an appointment to talk to a person directly. I lost count of how many times I heard the recorded message, We are experiencing longer than average hold times.

After 40 minutes on hold, an appointment in Escondido popped up for 2 p.m. the next day. I jumped on it. I learned later that day that all appointment slots had been filled for that week, so maybe openings were sporadically popping up because they were becoming available through cancellations.

Or maybe they were just glitches. I talked to someone at Optum who said they were looking into some issues with the website. In any case, the problems werent keeping people away from the testing sites.

I arrived a few minutes early for my appointment, and there were five people ahead of me, all wearing facial coverings and standing on blue Xs taped to the ground 6 feet apart.

Tip for anyone going to their appointment: have your email on your phone ready to show someone at the door, and write down the ID number you were assigned, because theyre going to ask for it.

The check-in process was smooth, and people were polite. I was invited inside through a side door, not the main lobby, and told to stand on a blue line while someone asked for my ID number. I then was directed to another room where I stood 6 feet from a table and talked to a woman I could barely see sitting at a table behind a sheet of thick plastic.

She double-checked my birthday and address and got other information, then handed me a couple of pieces of paper and a plastic bag with a swab and tube inside. I was asked to go around the corner and stand inside a blue square on the floor to wait my turn.

A woman who introduced herself as Sarah told me to sit in a blue plastic chair, then took the plastic bag and top sheet of paper. I asked her how many tests she had done that day, and she said,'Millions. She probably was a bit worn out, but still polite and patient. She told me I was getting a PCR test, which stands for polymerise chain reaction and involves a 6-inch nasopharyngeal swab to collect a sample that will be tested for viral particles.

Thats probably the part youve heard about. Sarah told me to drop my bandanna to expose my nose but still cover my face, and then she slid the swab into my right nostril. It felt like she got the whole 6 inches in there.

I was relieved I felt no sense of gagging or pressure. What I felt was, well, just weird. It felt like something was expanding deep inside my sinus as the swab rotated.

Another 10 seconds, she said. Youre doing great.

It felt like another 20 seconds might have passed before she said, Another five seconds. Doing great.

She then began extracting the swab, which she advised might be the uncomfortable part. It never hurt, but it felt like it was about to hurt, and like something - gray matter? - was being pulled out of my head.

And then it was all over. The actual test takes about 15 seconds. I saw the swab. It had not expanded after all and didnt appear to have brains or anything else stuck to it.

I was directed to follow more blue markings on the floor toward the exit, and I was out about 30 minutes after I arrived. About two hours later I got a text saying my results would be ready in 48 to 72 hours on the LHI.Care website.

My test was on a Thursday, and the nurse who administered it said results might not be ready until the following Monday as the weekend was coming up.

I still hadnt received a text notification late Monday, so I called a number on the LHI website and heard a message to press 2 for results, but got a recording that said, We are currently unable to answer your call. I might have called too late.

I called again the next morning, May 12, and got someone on the phone who said my results still were pending, five days after the test, and the delay might have happened because my test was in the afternoon, and the samples might not have been sent to the lab until the next day.

Then around 3:30 p.m. I got a text that the results were ready.

I logged in and downloaded a PDF that said I was....negative! The page also gave instructions for people with a positive or inconclusive result. People who tested positive but dont have symptoms were advised to stay home unless they need medical care and stay in a specific room as much as possible. People with serious symptoms are told to seek immediate care.

The results gave me some peace of mind, though they were from a test taken five days earlier. Ill still work from home, wear a facial covering around others, wash my hands frequently and use hand sanitizer when I touch anything outside. And while it was a concern, I have not developed a fear of cotton swabs.

Here is the original post:

This is what it's like to get a COVID-19 swab test - The San Diego Union-Tribune

Gwen Orlowski, executive director of the advocacy organization Disability Rights NJ, said she believes state officials were doing everything within their power to try to prevent the spread of the disease as best they could, given the fact that they really didnt know who had the virus. But without being able, early on, to test asymptomatic staffers who come and go from the facility, residents couldnt be protected, she said.

The rest is here:

At South Jersey center for disabled adults, COVID-19 has killed 8 while infecting most residents and many staf - The Philadelphia Inquirer

Editor's note:This article will be updated throughout the day with the latest COVID-19 news.

Posted 8:28 a.m.

As of Sunday morning, Pennsylvania has 61,611 positive cases according to the Department of Health. The state has also seen 4,403 total deaths.

As for Lancaster County, the county now has 2,470 positive cases according to the DOH.

-As of Saturday, May 16, Lancaster County has seen 255 COVID-19 related deaths.

Subscribe today for only $2

' + submsgtxthtml + '

Get unlimited access to breaking news, ancestry archives, our daily E-newspaper, games and more.

Subscribe today for only $2

' + submsgtxthtml + '

Get unlimited access to breaking news, ancestry archives, our daily E-newspaper, games and more.

Subscribe today for only $2

' + submsgtxthtml + '

Get unlimited access to breaking news, ancestry archives, our daily E-newspaper, games and more.

Subscribe today for only $2

' + submsgtxthtml + '

Read more:

Sunday's COVID-19 Updates: Pa. reaches 61611 positive cases, total deaths in the state rise to 4403 - LancasterOnline