Testing

I need a coronavirus test. What kind of test can I get and when will I get the result?

The key to taming the pandemic will be both a new commitment to “assurance testing” and a new vision of what public health really means.

While it battles a virus that can spread quickly via silent carriers, the United States has yet to execute a strategy for testing asymptomatic people. This is a problem — and ProPublica health reporter Caroline Chen explains why.

The Food and Drug Administration Friday reissued its emergency use authorization for the LabCorp COVID-19 RT-PCR Test to include authorized use for asymptomatic individuals and for pooled sample testing with up to five individual specimens. FDA previously authorized emergency use of the test for patients with suspected COVID-19 and individual specimens.

Individuals with and without symptoms at the time of testing have similar viral loads, suggesting significant transmission regardless of current symptom status.