Purchased home tests for COVID-19

[iuki]

If this should be posted elsewhere, please move this to the appropriate location.

 

When people purchase tests to be taken at home, if they do test positive, can they NOT report it?  Is it possible that there are positive unreported cases?  If someone tests positive, can they have someone take a test with a negative result and submit it as theirs?
 

I discovered that an unvaccinated employee of a restaurant had tested positive with a purchased home kit, and the restaurant never closed down.  So I can’t help but wonder how many cases go unreported.

 

How do the home tests work?

[aphrodite6528]

The only accepted at-home tests for pre-cruise have to be proctored -- you connect with someone online to watch you take the test and verify the result.  Taking a home test on your own is not acceptable to board a ship. 

[forgotmyCCname]

 The home tests used for boarding must be a proctored test. You can't just take a home test and show the results 

 

You download an app and then connect with a live person via video. Your ID is checked and the QR code on the test is scanned and recorded. You are watched while you prepare the test card, while you swab your nose. Once you have results in 15 minutes the proctor checks your results with you. Each test card has a unique identifying number and you cannot do a switch-a-roo.

 

The restaurant employee lied and used a no -proctored test.

 

 

[leisuretraveler223]

2 hours ago, iuki said:

I discovered that an unvaccinated employee of a restaurant had tested positive with a purchased home kit, and the restaurant never closed down.

 

Are you under the impression that businesses are actually shutting down because one staffer tested positive?  That hasn't happened in like a year.

[Biker19]

3 hours ago, iuki said:

 If someone tests positive, can they have someone take a test with a negative result and submit it as theirs?

Fake negative test results can probably be obtained, but unlikely from home monitored ones.

[dunedinmaiden]

1 hour ago, leisuretraveler223 said:

 

Are you under the impression that businesses are actually shutting down because one staffer tested positive?  That hasn't happened in like a year.

In our hometown in FL, there are currently three local restaurants closed due to positive employee COVID cases.

[shelpt]

2 hours ago, forgotmyCCname said:

 The home tests used for boarding must be a proctored test. You can't just take a home test and show the results 

 

You download an app and then connect with a live person via video. Your ID is checked and the QR code on the test is scanned and recorded. You are watched while you prepare the test card, while you swab your nose. Once you have results in 15 minutes the proctor checks your results with you. Each test card has a unique identifying number and you cannot do a switch-a-roo.

 

The restaurant employee lied and used a no -proctored test.

 

 

OP didn't say the employee lied. They only said the restaurant didn't close which is not required.

[mjkacmom]

10 minutes ago, dunedinmaiden said:

In our hometown in FL, there are currently three local restaurants closed due to positive employee COVID cases.

We have closed restaurants but they closed because they didn’t have enough staff to open, not because one tested positive. It’s when they all get it at once.

[Joseph2017China]

4 hours ago, iuki said:

If this should be posted elsewhere, please move this to the appropriate location.

 

When people purchase tests to be taken at home, if they do test positive, can they NOT report it?  Is it possible that there are positive unreported cases?  If someone tests positive, can they have someone take a test with a negative result and submit it as theirs?
 

I discovered that an unvaccinated employee of a restaurant had tested positive with a purchased home kit, and the restaurant never closed down.  So I can’t help but wonder how many cases go unreported.

 

How do the home tests work?

Why are you asking about a home test, that i not monitored for a restaurant employee?  This is a cruise line forum.  it is estimated that over one million people at any given day in just Florida, might have it.  But those were unverified estimates, since no one really knows the answer.  And no, doing a home test, not monitored is not reported. 

 

Edited January 3, 2022 by Joseph2017China

[Starry Eyes]

31 minutes ago, Biker19 said:

Fake negative test results can probably be obtained, but unlikely from home monitored ones.

When I took a proctored test, after the 15 minute waiting period, the proctor asked me about the lines I saw on the test kit (mine was negative), showed a chart and verbally confirmed my confirmed my response.  He never asked me to focus the camera on the interpretation area of the test card (though perhaps he could see it when the QR code was scanned; I have no way of knowing).  I wondered if the proctor could/would correct the client if client read a positive test as negative (perhaps an honest mistake by an amateur… maybe a faint line…or even a stronger line by a jerk who does not want travel plans spoiled).  

[forgotmyCCname]

18 minutes ago, shelpt said:

OP didn't say the employee lied. They only said the restaurant didn't close which is not required.

That doesn't change my explanation of how the home tests works.

I apologize profusely for misunderstanding the OP come t.

[Markanddonna]

Make sure you have an extra test kit. We had one with no liquid in the vial and fortunately had an extra. The first kit session was terminated and we had to start another.

[DCPIV]

1 hour ago, Starry Eyes said:

He never asked me to focus the camera on the interpretation area of the test card (though perhaps he could see it when the QR code was scanned; I have no way of knowing).

 

The proctor has asked me to hold the card up to the camera both times I've taken the test.  Of course, even if they didn't, there's a camera aimed at the thing while it develops, so it's there to be observed.

[renza]

2 hours ago, dunedinmaiden said:

In our hometown in FL, there are currently three local restaurants closed due to positive employee COVID cases.

I am in Florida as well. We have a restaurant that had to close only because all the staff had Covid. To close down because one employee got it is absurd. I have Covid and about 20 other people I know have it. Everyone will get this and it will be gone. Just wait another month it will be over. I guarantee the restaurants you are talking about did not close because of one positive employee. Lord 

[Starry Eyes]

3 minutes ago, DCPIV said:

 

The proctor has asked me to hold the card up to the camera both times I've taken the test.  Of course, even if they didn't, there's a camera aimed at the thing while it develops, so it's there to be observed.

I’m glad to hear if you felt your proctor also read the test.  Mine had me hold the card very close to the camera up to show the QR code on the test card but did not ask me to focus the camera on the testing window.  Maybe he observed the test window then too; I could not tell that he did.  The angle of my camera when the test kit was on a horizontal surface as it developed was not at all conducive to reading the result.  A positive can be just a faint line; antigen tests are low sensitivity and even lower if amateurs reading them miss faint lines.

[livingonthebeach]

How does the proctor know if someone is using someone else’s ID?  I know a drivers license has a photo but some of those photos are 20 years old. 

[iuki]

18 hours ago, leisuretraveler223 said:

 

Are you under the impression that businesses are actually shutting down because one staffer tested positive?  That hasn't happened in like a year.

Here in Hawaii, if an employee tests positive for COVID-19, the restaurant closes down, all the employees are tested, and the restaurant is thoroughly sanitized, and doesn’t reopen until the employees are tested negative.

[iuki]

17 hours ago, Joseph2017China said:

Why are you asking about a home test, that i not monitored for a restaurant employee?  This is a cruise line forum.  it is estimated that over one million people at any given day in just Florida, might have it.  But those were unverified estimates, since no one really knows the answer.  And no, doing a home test, not monitored is not reported. 

 

I asked this in the cruise line forum because we are booked for a cruise in May.  I wanted to know how the home tests work since I have never had to be tested.  I mentioned about the restaurant employee because the person took a home test and it appeared to not have been reported.  So I wanted to know how the home tests work.  Now I do.

[iuki]

17 hours ago, Starry Eyes said:

When I took a proctored test, after the 15 minute waiting period, the proctor asked me about the lines I saw on the test kit (mine was negative), showed a chart and verbally confirmed my confirmed my response.  He never asked me to focus the camera on the interpretation area of the test card (though perhaps he could see it when the QR code was scanned; I have no way of knowing).  I wondered if the proctor could/would correct the client if client read a positive test as negative (perhaps an honest mistake by an amateur… maybe a faint line…or even a stronger line by a jerk who does not want travel plans spoiled).  

Thanks for the detailed info.

[cruizzing]

To clarify, there are home tests that:

1) Are NOT proctored 

2) Are proctored - Royal only accepts this type. 

So yes, someone can test positive and it not be reported (anywhere), but they wouldn't be able to test positive and board the ship, as confirmation of a negative test is visually checked at the pier.

 

[iuki]

22 minutes ago, cruizzing said:

To clarify, there are home tests that:

1) Are NOT proctored 

2) Are proctored - Royal only accepts this type. 

So yes, someone can test positive and it not be reported (anywhere), but they wouldn't be able to test positive and board the ship, as confirmation of a negative test is visually checked at the pier.

 

Thank you.  Makes you wonder about the statistics reported to the public.  😬

[Biker19]

2 hours ago, iuki said:

Makes you wonder about the statistics reported to the public.

Welcome to March 2020.

[Joseph2017China]

5 hours ago, iuki said:

Thank you.  Makes you wonder about the statistics reported to the public.  😬

I don't wonder, see my post above.  It is estimated by some groups that at least one million a day in just Florida is walking around with it.  However, that number is an estimate, not verified, since those people are not tested, or even show signs of it.  

 

People love the numbers, but those numbers are far from accurate.  It's just another feel good measure

 

[bouhunter]

On 1/3/2022 at 4:35 AM, iuki said:

 

I discovered that an unvaccinated employee of a restaurant had tested positive with a purchased home kit, and the restaurant never closed down.  So I can’t help but wonder how many cases go unreported.

 

 

Seriously?  If every business who had an employee test positive "closed down", practically NOTHING would be open.  Forever, since covid isn't going away.

[fred30]

I probably heard of more people that used at-home test to verify they had Covid then getting an official test.

Some families only 1 out the the family gets official test and the rest just assume what they have is Covid because it fits in with the timing.

That is a large percentage of people that are not in the test results.

But are they as the CDC may be showing estimated results.  They have done that many times before.