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A question for Dr. HHH about State testing statements
Dr,
I’m hoping you can draw from some of your CDC experiences and contacts with those in the public health field to answer this question. Hopefully this is a little deeper than the usual testing question. I had a very low risk and decided to be tested on National Testing Day at eight weeks after my exposure. The tester explained to me that 90 percent of people seroconvert by 3 months and so the test was meaningless. I questioned her information, and she showed me the same information written on a card from the Maryland AIDS Administration. The local news here had cited the same statistics from the Virginia agency. Both of these organizations are headed by MDs and (I’m almost sure) receive Federal funding from CDC. They must receive money from the State taxpayers. As you know, Massachusetts AIDS services would declare this 8-week test absolutely conclusive without qualification since I’m a healthy young male.
Common sense tells me that MA could never get away with their 6-week window periods if MD and VA were anywhere near correct with their statistics. So, why does CDC allow these State health initiatives, of which they hold the purse strings, to offer such divergent information? The MD and VA stats of 90 percent by 3 months scared me, and I think it’s doing the public a horrendous disserve to quote these numbers. I understand the legal need to be conservative, but isn’t this just a lie? Am I right that the scientific consensus is 95% by 6 weeks and 98% by 8 weeks? Have any of your colleagues, assuming they agree with these numbers, expressed dissatisfaction with what the States are saying? I doubt that the Oraquicks they're using in MA show positive results months before those same tests in MD.
I’m hoping you can draw from some of your CDC experiences and contacts with those in the public health field to answer this question. Hopefully this is a little deeper than the usual testing question. I had a very low risk and decided to be tested on National Testing Day at eight weeks after my exposure. The tester explained to me that 90 percent of people seroconvert by 3 months and so the test was meaningless. I questioned her information, and she showed me the same information written on a card from the Maryland AIDS Administration. The local news here had cited the same statistics from the Virginia agency. Both of these organizations are headed by MDs and (I’m almost sure) receive Federal funding from CDC. They must receive money from the State taxpayers. As you know, Massachusetts AIDS services would declare this 8-week test absolutely conclusive without qualification since I’m a healthy young male.
Common sense tells me that MA could never get away with their 6-week window periods if MD and VA were anywhere near correct with their statistics. So, why does CDC allow these State health initiatives, of which they hold the purse strings, to offer such divergent information? The MD and VA stats of 90 percent by 3 months scared me, and I think it’s doing the public a horrendous disserve to quote these numbers. I understand the legal need to be conservative, but isn’t this just a lie? Am I right that the scientific consensus is 95% by 6 weeks and 98% by 8 weeks? Have any of your colleagues, assuming they agree with these numbers, expressed dissatisfaction with what the States are saying? I doubt that the Oraquicks they're using in MA show positive results months before those same tests in MD.
There are no tests that are approved to give one a conclusive result earlier than three months.
A test taken at 8 weeks is very reliable, you can trust those results. Until the official guidelines in the US change, people will be advised to test at 3 months, that's the policy.
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