Quebec hits record 3,127 Covid cases
Quebec’s broken its record with 3,127 new Covid cases over the last 24 hours.
I’m not one of them. I’d been feeling achy and shivery for a day or two, so I took myself off to the testing station on Crémazie on Friday afternoon, and got the negative result overnight. Nobody should hesitate if in doubt: the test is quick and not in the least uncomfortable.
They asked why I was there, and I told them about feeling kind of crappy. They also asked where I thought I might’ve been exposed, which I couldn’t answer. Except for sorties to get groceries – which I’ve held down to once a week for the most part – I’ve seen nobody. But with something this contagious, who knows?
Bill Binns 14:25 on 2021-01-09 Permalink
Congrats on the negative result. You said it wasn’t unpleasant. I guess this was not the sort of test where they jam a Q-Tip 3 or 4 inches up your nose?
I want to eventually get the antibody test. I strongly suspect I had Covid while on the road in Washington early last February. I was flat on my back in a crappy Best Western unable to work or travel for almost 2 weeks.
Kate 14:33 on 2021-01-09 Permalink
The nurse did one swab in my throat and a second in my nose. Remembering a clinic nurse who made me totally gag once with a strep throat swab, I kind of flinched for a second, but it was nothing. The nose thing was also totally nothing.
nau 15:54 on 2021-01-09 Permalink
Probably you don’t have it, but a friend of mine in England who just did tested negative the first time. Other people in his household had already had positive tests, so he was pretty sure he had it. When his symptoms got a bit worse, he then tested positive. So, keep an open mind if your symptoms don’t resolve quickly; false negatives can occur in the early stages.
This is anecdotal of course, but he also said that lots of cautious people he knows have caught it recently with no obvious exposure possibilities beyond going to the grocery store. The thinking is that the new variant is so much more transmissible that the measures we have used up to now are less likely to stop transmission. Scientific proof of that isn’t there yet, but fwiw he works in medical genetics research, is scientifically literate and not given to hasty conclusions. If the more transmissible variants start to spread here, we should expect more stringent measures (socially and personally) will be needed to get R below 1 (and pretending the virus mostly spreads between 8:00 p.m. and 5:00 a.m. isn’t going to cut it).
david51 16:05 on 2021-01-09 Permalink
I think they have two tests now, a much less invasive one. When I was being tested back in March, they jammed a 10 inch long q-tip thing up both sides of your nose to what seemed like your brain, and swabbed around for like 30 seconds. For like hours afterward you feel a super unpleasant pressure that I could see causing nausea in some people.
DeWolf 17:47 on 2021-01-09 Permalink
I also got my first test earlier this week due to a possible Covid exposure. (I feel perfectly fine but wanted to be safe – test came back negative. I’m still isolating until two weeks after the exposure, just to be sure.) I was dreading the nose swab but it was not bad at all. And I was the only person in the testing facility, aside from the nurses and other workers. 10/10, would recommend for anyone feeling crappy or who is concerned about a possible exposure.
Kate 18:15 on 2021-01-09 Permalink
Bill Binns: I’d like to get the antibody test as well. Early in February I caught something that made me cough and knocked me out for 4-5 days. This was before anyone here thought they could catch the new virus, and there was no testing yet. It cleared up pretty fast and the cough didn’t hang around. I’ve no idea if it could’ve been the Rona.
nau: thanks for the reminder. I am hardly going out at all anyway, but will be careful to mask up if anyone comes to the door with a delivery.