Chat about Novel Coronavirus - 2019-nCoV - COVID-19

2 years in, wife had it, sisters and their family had it, friends had it, colleagues had it, mother had it. I avoided it somehow

Was out with friends for first time in ages and blam I get it.

Weekend COVID cases now as high as the previous Omnicron peak

At least boosters are being brought forward, but it's a matter of when you will get it now, not if if you ask pessimistic me.

Our local rates are running at about 1100 per 100,000 like @JWestland I think my dance card is marked. I wonder when my employer (the NHS) will start second booster for its staff?

The current 7-day average of reported cases is at about a half of the first Omicron peak, although there might be less testing going on.

it's a matter of when you will get it now, not if if you ask pessimistic me

This has been obvious for months. We’re all going to get it many times, over our lifetimes.

although there might be less testing going on

About a third of the testing being reported.

Tx I was going by the guardian weekend cases. That is just one big peak not a rolling average.

Well I'd expect to get it at some point but all caution is thrown to the wind as "it's over" "we just need to live with it".

Ok but I'm avoiding certain events until I'm done renovating then!

Thought that a 4th booster was expected after 3months after the 3rd.

Faintest of faint positive on an LFT this morning - we were exposed at the weekend (had a neighbour's child over on a play date, they all tested +ve next morning).

I took the test, as I can feel a URTI developing - my breathing is getting a bit laboured (similar to asthma, but with an uncontrolled cough at the end).

This morning, I felt otherwise fine, but that changed sharpish, and I went to bed for a few hours.

So, plans involving going out have been cancelled (lol, what plans?), and hunkering down for a few days of avoiding being near anyone in the house.

I'll retest tomorrow, but then not bother until after the weekend. It's not as if we have many tests left in any case.

Faintest of faint positive on an LFT

I so easily could have missed my first faint positive. In fact, I read it as negative but I just happened to glance at it a couple of hours later after it had dried out a bit and the line was more visible.

In other news, my ingrained addiction to quantifying and measuring everything has crept into my Covid experience.

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Now build a camera rig to take a picture of each one and plot brightness of T line pixels on a chart

Nah, I'm just going to keep testing and then scrape all of those lovely gold nanospheres off the tests and make myself a rad bit of jewelry.

So. No more free tests from the end of next week. None currently available to order from NHS website. Anyone know how much these are going to cost and whether they will be widely available?

I was able to order some just before 8am this morning.

£7.90 for 4 at Boots
https://www.boots.com/flowflex-antigen-rapid-test-lateral-flow-self-testing-kit-4-kit-bundle-10314028

If you're on the twitters, @lft_alert is pretty good for letting you know when they are in stock (for the next couple of days). Seems to be that there is a batch released around 8pm most days.

Seems to be that there is a batch released around 8pm most days.

Yes, just ordered some now (8.31pm). (This will be the last batch I order given the new "Do you really need to order the free ones any more?" question on the gov.uk website - my wife works with the local primary school so she needs to have some for that.)

If you want to keep tests in hand then I (personally) wouldn't be testing on days 2-4. Can imagine you want a confirmatory test (day 1) the day after an initial positive (day 0) but then the advice is not to waste tests until day 5.

Bit late but I think any sign after the correct timeframe can be a false positive (usually says as much in the instructions)

I have been told to continue testing every working day, apparently when I enter my .nhs.uk or .nhs.net email address they will be free.

Got some this morning and good to know they are also available at Boots, thanks all.

Day 9 for me today and my line is very much still there.
Annoyingly it's made my tinnitus worse, I do hope it settles down...

I'm going outside in a bit!

Mainly for my first day at a new job but end of 10 days, almost negative yesterday and probs fully negative today when I do it. My daughter picked it up though, unvaccinated 11 year old, seems fine, was coughing the other day but refusing paracetamol at the moment and wouldn't shut up when we played cards in the garden yesterday. I mainly wanted to avoid inflecting my wife who is still ruined from long covid from last summer, I fear it may have gone me>kid>wife though. Slept in my own bed last night instead of on the sofa, worst nights sleep I've had in a week.

Colleague has it now, late 20s and more like a flu he says.

Always very careful, he traveled to see family abroad. They all tested negative, so somebody on the plane / bus etc. must have had it?

This will be the last batch I order given the new "Do you really need to order the free ones any more?" question on the gov.uk website

I want to continue testing before I see vulnerable people, eg my parents, and before I go to the office as I feel it is the right thing to do so I'm ordering as many boxes as I can. Also the 72 hour and not always available thing has gamified it.

£7.90 for 4 from Boots means I can do just that and won't risk depriving more vulnerable/needy people from getting tests.

https://www.boots.com/flowflex-antigen-rapid-test-lateral-flow-self-testing-kit-4-kit-bundle-10314028

And for forty quid you can have a private GP appointment next time you need one and save the NHS paid slots for someone else.

I think we should all use NHS services to the full and campaign for better provision, not opt out where we can while the wealthy and powerful allow free services to be run down because they don't need/use them.