[HN Gopher] Children are spoofing Covid-19 tests with soft drinks
___________________________________________________________________
Children are spoofing Covid-19 tests with soft drinks
Author : 34679
Score : 266 points
Date : 2021-07-19 09:38 UTC (13 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.bbc.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.bbc.com)
| hatware wrote:
| Does everyone in this thread blindly believe that the PCR tests
| were handled _ethically_? It's pretty widely known that the cycle
| number was cranked to an insane value, so there were tons of
| false positives from the beginning.
|
| Hilariously, the cycle count was recommended to be reduced in
| lockstep with Biden taking office:
| https://www.who.int/news/item/20-01-2021-who-information-not...
|
| CoViD iSnT pOLiTiCaL
| vmception wrote:
| this article isn't about PCR tests which would be unaffected by
| children's drinks
|
| yes, we are aware of the filter bubble where people find the
| WHO's clarification of an existing prior policy as evidence of
| a PCR test sensitivity issue timed to make Biden in the US look
| better. there is a website where you can take a peak of various
| filter bubbles to see how strong the reinforcing information is
| for any particular rabbit hole. yours just happens to be
| hilarious. everything is open now, in the US, and you are stuck
| on that, something that is both inconsequential and will never
| be revisited. the awareness might seem like activism but it
| really is the bread and circuses, for you.
| swiley wrote:
| Children should be able to learn remotely at will if for nothing
| more than safety and teaching them not to put up with arbitrary
| BS.
| TheDudeMan wrote:
| < Pedanti-sense tingling > They are not spoofing the test -- the
| test is real. They are spoofing the positive result.
| [deleted]
| disabled wrote:
| Not surprising. I have type 1 diabetes (autoimmune and insulin
| dependent).
|
| I added a drop of coke/sugar to my blood drop as a way to get out
| of school, as the blood sugar result would appear very high!
|
| If I wanted it to appear low, I diluted my blood with an alcohol
| swab (used when testing your blood) or with a drop of water.
| basisword wrote:
| Amazing how determined kids can be at trying to get off school!
|
| The downside to this is that it deprives their classmates as
| entire bubbles get sent home I think.
| mschuster91 wrote:
| > The downside to this is that it deprives their classmates as
| entire bubbles get sent home I think.
|
| It would have been the job of _governments_ to actually
| _govern_ , by transforming schools to work digitally. Just look
| at Denmark - their schools have been digitalized for over two
| decades (https://www.aktiv-online.de/news/digitale-schule-in-
| daenemar...). All they had to do was tell the kids to stay home
| and that's it. No deprivation, no negative effects.
|
| The complete inaction (how many schools have bought and
| installed air purifiers vs. how many parliaments?) and
| incompetence that has been shown towards children all over the
| Western world in the coronavirus crisis is _utterly utterly
| inexcusable_.
| briandear wrote:
| How many kids have died from the Wuhan Coronavirus?
| mschuster91 wrote:
| Half of the kids who contract Covid19 suffer from "long
| covid" (per
| https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7927578/).
| This is _really, really bad_.
|
| The worse thing is: _every_ person contracting the virus
| can develop a mutation that escapes vaccines - and children
| can spread it to their parents and grandparents.
|
| You never had children I assume? Just look at your
| coworkers how often they fall sick because of some nasty
| flu or other bug their children caught in kindergarten or
| school.
|
| And your "Wuhan coronavirus" naming ... the only people
| I've heard who call the virus by that name or its similar
| "China virus" are right-wingers and corona / vaccine
| deniers.
| logicalmonster wrote:
| > Half of the kids who contract Covid19 suffer from "long
| covid"
|
| I don't doubt that there's some likely some fairly common
| short-medium term health impacts from a nasty flu that's
| relatively new and unknown. But I strongly wonder how
| much of these supposed "long-covid" symptoms may be
| wounds that are partially self-inflicted by society. I
| believe that natural (and already quite bad) activity
| patterns have been altered negatively since Covid started
| and this may have a wide-scale health impact that the
| establishment doesn't care about. These symptoms may
| partially stem from basically keeping people locked up
| inside for months, the media feeding them constant scare
| stories and stressing them out (stress can prevent good
| sleep and has many other negative health effects), people
| eating garbage food because there's not as much else to
| do, people not getting as much sun (Vitamin D exposure)
| and exercise as they should be getting, the depressions
| coming from the unnatural social life we've been forced
| to endure (covering faces, only communicating via video
| chats), etc.
|
| > And your "Wuhan coronavirus" naming ... the only people
| I've heard who call the virus by that name or its similar
| "China virus" are right-wingers and corona / vaccine
| deniers.
|
| May I ask what does an idealogical compliance check add
| to the conversation?
| nicoburns wrote:
| > I don't doubt that there's some likely some fairly
| common short-medium term health impacts from a nasty flu
| that's relatively new and unknown. But I strongly wonder
| how much of these supposed "long-covid" symptoms may be
| wounds that are partially self-inflicted by society.
|
| Activity patterns will no doubt have had some negative
| impact, but they are not even close to accounting for
| long-covid symptoms. A change in activity doesn't account
| for a sudden inability to breathe properly, fatigue so
| severe that walking is difficult, inflamed hearts, or
| many of the myriad of other symptoms that long-covid
| sufferers have reported.
| mschuster91 wrote:
| > But I strongly wonder how much of these supposed "long-
| covid" symptoms may be wounds that are partially self-
| inflicted by society.
|
| Better political action - e.g. following _basic science_
| by mandating _and enforcing_ masks, enforcing actual
| lockdowns, making tests and sick days accessible,
| supporting poor people who don 't have a realistic choice
| between working sick and not having something to eat, and
| now that there's vaccines available making them mandatory
| - would have saved _a lot_ of these wounds!
|
| The differences in coronavirus-caused interruptions
| between countries with solid leadership and a societal
| sense of solidarity (e.g. New Zealand, but also many
| Asian countries for the better part of the last year) and
| right-wing populist-led or -influenced countries such as
| the US, Brazil or most of Europe can't be denied any
| more.
|
| We all need to hold our politicians accountable for their
| mismanagement and recklessness if we want a chance at
| restoring our societies and healing the rift.
|
| > May I ask what does an idealogical compliance check add
| to the conversation?
|
| Simple: I don't want to engage with right wing people and
| conspiracy myth spreaders in the meatspace and I want to
| do the same online.
| tomp wrote:
| > I don't want to engage with right wing people and
| conspiracy myth spreaders in the meatspace and I want to
| do the same online.
|
| I'm really glad that you're not in charge.
| logicalmonster wrote:
| > enforcing actual lockdowns
|
| I don't know if you read or understood my comment, but
| the self-inflicted wounds I describe such as stress, lack
| of exercise, bad diets, and other problems associated
| with "long-covid" may be at least partially due to
| lockdowns. If this is the case, your prescribed solution
| may exacerbate the problems. A controlled study on this
| would be interesting.
|
| > The differences in coronavirus-caused interruptions
| between countries with solid leadership and a societal
| sense of solidarity (e.g. New Zealand, but also many
| Asian countries for the better part of the last year) and
| right-wing populist-led or -influenced countries such as
| the US, Brazil or most of Europe can't be denied any
| more.
|
| Without getting into a full-on political debate about the
| merits of freedom and a good economy's role in preserving
| vulnerable peoples' lives, I'd like to point out that
| Covid's effects in different countries may have more than
| 1 variable that no leader could have solved.
|
| For instance:
|
| * As a relatively isolated island nation, New Zealand had
| the luxury to lockdown in a way that relatively few
| nations have.
|
| * Compared to most of the world and especially Asia,
| Americans are heavier, which seems likely to negatively
| impact outcomes from this illness.
|
| * America has large populations of people who suffer from
| Vitamin D deficiency that seems linked to Covid problems
| that other countries do not have.
|
| > Simple: I don't want to engage with right wing people
| and conspiracy myth spreaders in the meatspace and I want
| to do the same online.
|
| Fair enough. Personally, I believe in diversity and
| diverse ideas and would be interested in engaging with
| the left, right, middle, libertarian, communist, you name
| it. Even authoritarians too.
| bmn__ wrote:
| Another group who use that name are the libertarians who
| recognise that the Tedros rename to sars2/covid is a
| _Kampfbegriff_ and refuse to use it out of principle in
| order to avoid supporting the CCP propaganda efforts.
| They are politically diametrically opposed to right-
| wingers and do not deny the existence of virus /disease.
| fsagx wrote:
| Why highlight the very small, early study with _Half of
| the kids who contract Covid19 suffer from "long covid"_?
|
| The next paragraph in your link gives 14.5%:
| The UK Office for National Statistics's latest report
| estimates that 12.9 per cent of UK children aged 2 to 11,
| and 14.5 per cent of children aged 12 to 16, still have
| symptoms five weeks after their first infection. Almost
| 500,000 UK children have tested positive for covid-19
| since March 2020. Most medical bodies say it
| normally takes a few days or weeks to recover from
| covid-19, and that most will make a full recovery
| within 12 weeks.
| sokoloff wrote:
| > All they had to do was tell the kids to stay home and
| that's it. No deprivation, no negative effects.
|
| I think that kids are absolutely deprived of beneficial
| social interactions when they are sent to be schooled at home
| versus in-person. Schooling is not solely about academic
| achievement. Source: I have a 10 and 12 year old who lived
| this on and off for the last 16 months.
|
| Thought about another way: if there truly was no negative
| effect, why isn't the education being done 100% remotely in
| normal conditions? Why have such expensive buildings and
| transportation needs if there's no benefit?
| mschuster91 wrote:
| > Why have such expensive buildings and transportation
| needs if there's no benefit?
|
| Because modern capitalism demands that children be kept at
| school for most of the day - in Germany we call the trend
| "Ganztagsschule"/"whole day school" - so that both parents
| can be exploited.
|
| Decades ago, school days were _far_ shorter and there were
| no such things as school lunches simply because 99% of
| children had a parent at home able to feed them. When
| children were sick, they were kept at home instead of
| spreading their germs at school.
|
| We need to get working hours and wages under control. 20
| hours of work a week should be more than enough, given the
| massive automation gains over the last decades.
| sokoloff wrote:
| If 20 hours a week is enough to live "normally", I think
| you'll find a _whole lot of people_ choosing to work 50
| hours per week to get to retirement in 10 years instead
| of 45. (At which point, the income provided by 20 hours
| /week will not have anywhere near the purchasing power
| that might allow it to be "enough" because so many
| households will have adults working a total of 50-100
| hours per week, which will tend to out-compete households
| working only 20 or 40 hours per week.).
|
| https://www.mrmoneymustache.com/2012/01/13/the-
| shockingly-si...
| ant6n wrote:
| Ah the good old times when men where in charge and women
| kept at home to man the heath
| nanis wrote:
| > The downside to this is that it deprives their classmates
|
| Assume probability of false positive is 1%. If you are tested
| weekly, there is a 41% chance you'll falsely test positive at
| least once in a year. If you are tested every workday, 93%
| chance. This is assuming there is no malfeasance.
|
| If you assume a false positive probability of 5%, the
| probabilities go up to 93% and 100%.
|
| The negative effects of false positives are the same whether
| kids are using soda or something else is causing them. At some
| point, the costs have to be weighed against the benefits.
|
| Here is a false positive/false negative simulator I put
| together last year (thrice silently banned -- so I stopped
| trying to do more after restoring it one last time) helps you
| explore what happens with various scenarios of infection rates
| and false positive/negative probabilities.
|
| Linking to the discussion to provide context for the app:
|
| https://www.covid2020.icu/false-positive-false-negative-simu...
| BenjiWiebe wrote:
| My workspace immediately retests if you get a positive. While
| you wait.
| dtech wrote:
| That seems like a good way to miss infections (and get
| people back to work, which is probably the point).
|
| The tests seem to have a high false-negative rate. Assuming
| independence and 25% FN rate, a second test will miss an
| additional 20% of infections of all people tested.
| yarcob wrote:
| Same at my kids school. Whenever they have a positive
| antibody test, they just do it again.
|
| I think that the antibody tests are sketchy in the first
| place, but if they don't even stick to the protocol and
| don't follow up positive antibody tests with PCR tests,
| it's almost pointless.
| nanis wrote:
| PCR or something else? If PCR, is the number of cycles pre-
| set or is that a choice variable?
| makomk wrote:
| Part of the reason it took so long to roll out these lateral
| flow tests is that it was hard to find ones with an
| acceptably low false positive rate - it needed to be well
| below 1% for exactly the reason you outline. (Apparently PHE
| estimates it at less than 1 in 1000: https://publichealthmatt
| ers.blog.gov.uk/2021/03/30/covid-19-... )
|
| Even when the rate of Covid infections in the UK was much
| lower than it currently is, retesting of people using PCR
| suggested that the large majority of positives were in fact
| true positives, at least amongst the adults retested. It's
| possible that the story is different for kids, but on the
| other hand they're not vaccinated in the UK whereas many
| adults are...
| cmiller1 wrote:
| Maybe we should attempt to improve the education system so
| children are happier to be there...
| dylan604 wrote:
| This made me literally LOL. You will NEVER be able to make
| all children happy with going to school. Attempting it is
| almost a fool's errand. Even in nice posh schools, there will
| still be kids unhappy. It's just human nature.
| LinuxBender wrote:
| I would have loved to go to the school Elon Musk built [1]
| [2] [3] [4] had it existed when I was a kid.
|
| [1] - https://astranova.org/apply
|
| [2] - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MFOEyqqGuEI [video]
|
| [3] - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Io3TiuJsfLc [video]
|
| [4] - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kO22X2AV2xg [video]
| djrogers wrote:
| And many of my friends would have been miserable there.
| Point is, you can't make all kids happy.
| LinuxBender wrote:
| Agreed. And building out the variety of schools /
| teaching styles required to make a majority happy would
| probably be cost prohibitive.
| GuB-42 wrote:
| Is it one of these Montessori-like schools? This is
| actually a century-old thing.
|
| Yes, it has some advantages, but most of them come from
| the admission process and high budget. The main problem I
| see is that you are in a bubble, not like the other kids.
| It makes it difficult to reintegrate the regular school
| system if you ever need to. Obviously not a problem for
| Elon Musk kids, but it may be for middle class children.
| pmarreck wrote:
| If I was in a bubble of self-motivated learners, I think
| that would have been awesome, because most public schools
| are run like a prison. I got into so much trouble just
| from being bored...
| LinuxBender wrote:
| It is very much like the Montessori schools, albeit a
| different curriculum than any I've seen. I would have
| been fine being in a bubble. In the school system I went
| through, I was in a ditch. I would ace all the tests but
| fail my classes for lack of interest and not seeing any
| benefit to what I was being taught. I am very stubborn
| and strong willed. This had no real impact on my life
| beyond being a waste of time. Again, just my preference.
| I would have loved being in a school like Elon created
| but that is just my personal preference based on how I
| know I learn. I see the current school system as a low
| quality baby sitter.
| saiya-jin wrote:
| ... which is a childish reaction from what is seemingly an
| adult person.
|
| Yes globally school systems need a massive rehaul, anybody
| can name easily 10 things that would improve schools for
| everyone, probably any school. No we shouldn't give up just
| because its hard and we already went through it.
|
| Its one of the fuckin' most important things for human
| civilization, if not the #1 item long term. We don't need
| to strive for perfection, practically all major
| improvements would be worth it.
| JTbane wrote:
| You can try with different teaching methods.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waldorf_education
| pmarreck wrote:
| I never heard of this and went in with an open mind.
|
| > One study conducted by California State University at
| Sacramento researchers outlined numerous theories and
| ideas prevalent throughout Waldorf curricula that were
| patently pseudoscientific and steeped in magical
| thinking.
|
| Well, so much for that idea.
| AlexAndScripts wrote:
| That only appeals to a part of the population. Some of us
| want to do more than knit.
| listenallyall wrote:
| This is true, however, of nearly all human pursuits. You
| will never eliminate all poverty, you will never eliminate
| all racism, you will never reach a point where everyone
| says the climate is just fine, you will never make everyone
| healthy or safe enough.
|
| Your options are to "literally LOL" and consider making
| progress to be a "fool's errand," or you can recognize that
| eliminating these problems may be impossible but making
| significant progress is not.
| paul_f wrote:
| Or, maybe we should stop testing asymptomatic people
| DocTomoe wrote:
| Actually, that sounds like a horrible idea if you try to
| prevent superspreader events.
|
| If anything, we need more testing, not less, to contain
| earlier.
| rytcio wrote:
| Like the antifa/blm riots?
| pmarreck wrote:
| Outdoor transmission rates are negligible.
|
| Unless you are Trump blithering on in front of a crowd in
| the Rose Garden, of course
| bpodgursky wrote:
| There was a corresponding indoor event which almost
| certainly was the spreader event in this case.
| nradov wrote:
| In most countries containment stopped being a feasible
| option back in March 2020.
| pmarreck wrote:
| You sound like a squib, not a muggle
| the-dude wrote:
| Everybody happy! I bet you would get mighty popular.
| 1-more wrote:
| >Absorbed on the red pad are antibodies that bind to the Covid-19
| virus. They are also attached to gold nanoparticles (tiny
| particles of gold actually appear red), which allow us to see
| where the antibodies are on the device.
|
| Gold appearing red when in small-enough particles is used to make
| stained glass:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stained_glass#Red_glass
| dijksterhuis wrote:
| Kudos to whichever kid discovered this. They're a damn
| industrious lot when it comes to avoiding school work.
| Hoasi wrote:
| Ingenuity at work is always a beautiful sight.
| MKais wrote:
| True story: During Zoom classes, a friend's kid used to move
| his lips without emitting any sound faking a mic problem in
| order to not receive questions from his teacher
| skocznymroczny wrote:
| Cartman?
| baryphonic wrote:
| When I was in high school, we had one BC Calculus teacher for
| the entire school district. He'd visit each school round-
| robin and would teach the other schools via video conference.
| Given that this was 20 years ago, we'd have streaming issues
| with some frequency. The solution was usually to reboot the
| streaming machine at the teacher's location.
|
| One day before class when the teacher wasn't at our school,
| one kid said, "when I cough three times, everyone freeze."
| About 20 mins into the lecture, he did just that and we all
| held our positions. The teacher noticed about ten second
| later, asked us a bunch of times if we could hear him, and
| then, with exasperation, said, "well looks like they froze up
| again..."
|
| We had a good laugh for the two mins or so we were down and
| then continued on. I don't think anyone ever blabbed that we
| had faked it just for kicks.
| Buttons840 wrote:
| My daughter did kindergarten online. I once observed that
| at least some kid behaviors remain the same online.
|
| The teacher lost connection one day and one of the kids
| said "she's gone!" and it was immediate chaos, everyone
| started talking and making noises, one kid was literally
| screaming the whole time, the kids were drawing on the
| screen and fighting over who was sharing their screen,
| everyone was laughing and having a good time until the
| teacher reconnected. Later my daughter fondly told me about
| it, but I had already overheard the whole thing from the
| other room.
| [deleted]
| nigerian1981 wrote:
| Reminds me of the boy who changed his name on Zoom to
| Reconnecting
| peterburkimsher wrote:
| I think the name to use is "Connecting audio..."
|
| and then black out the webcam (don't turn it off). Then the
| name shows up in the corner, and nobody will nominate you
| to speak. Heard this via a church group from a teacher at
| the International School of Geneva. Seems like word gets
| around fast!
| shoto_io wrote:
| Awesome pro move!
| dvfjsdhgfv wrote:
| In my daughter's school during PE on Zoom one kid always had
| only the left half of his body showing, everybody thought
| it's a limitation of his camera or something. Then one day
| his cat moved his laptop and everybody realized he was moving
| only the visible part of his body and was playing on his
| phone in the other hand the whole time.
| thrower123 wrote:
| Physical Education class over Zoom is something that I
| never contemplated being attempted
| Kye wrote:
| It's the natural evolution of exercise tapes.
| avs733 wrote:
| my boomer-aged mother is a PE teacher for K-6th graders
| in the US. She had to run Zoom PE classes for about six
| months...it was interesting to watch her learn a new
| competency.
|
| There are ways to do it, but the fear that she could
| potentially not be in control of her classroom at ANY
| MOMENT was something to behold and says something about
| our education system's focus and beliefs. There was a lot
| of information from me and my siblings with her on how to
| do it and options she could pursue to make online PE
| class engaging...fun times
| _nalply wrote:
| My wife had Kundalini Yoga over Zoom and I liked the
| results.
| rpmisms wrote:
| This is somewhat crude, but does meaningfully contribute
| to the discussion.
| listless wrote:
| I feel like we should find these kids and get them out of
| school where their time is being wasted. Let's get them into
| some proper practical training that lines up with their
| interests or hell, just hire them and teach them on the job. In
| fact, maybe we could do that for....all the kids?
|
| "School is not a place for smart people" - Rich Sanchez
| dado3212 wrote:
| Not sure that quoting Rick and Morty like it's some kind of
| gospel is the best argument for education reform.
| listless wrote:
| It was somewhat tongue in cheek - but only somewhat. But
| points for getting the reference.
| idiotsecant wrote:
| The only thing more delicious than an unironically 'I got
| a big brain' Rick and Morty quote is when the person
| making the quote is super confident about how obscure it
| is.
| floren wrote:
| Isn't that line from the very first episode of the whole
| show?
| milkey_mouse wrote:
| It could just as easily have been a quote from Foucault.
| Not sure that makes it any less edgy though.
| rpmisms wrote:
| It's true. Time and again we hear stories of bright kids
| being beaten into submission by the aggressive uniformity
| of our school system.
| soperj wrote:
| Definitely did stuff like this in school. I was in a honours
| social studies class, and would consistently say "We're the
| honours class, there's got to be a better way to teach this"
| whenever our teacher decided we were just going to take notes
| for the day. He was always very excited about it, and would
| come up with huge class exercises to teach the topic. It was
| really awesome but would end up taking the whole week instead
| of the one day worth of note taking. We ended up doing about
| 1/4 of the curriculum that year, and the final was incredibly
| short.
| lxgr wrote:
| Heard a story from a secondary school teacher during the second
| lockdown about one of her students that wouldn't enable the
| video camera because "it's pay-per-minute on their computer".
|
| And sure enough, in the age of everything-as-a-service, that
| was just about believable to the teacher.
| 271828182846 wrote:
| This wasn't "discovered" by any kid. That observation has been
| around for a while and its source is people who looked for
| reasons to discredit the meaningfulness of that test.
| petercooper wrote:
| You may also like this story where a young girl figured out a
| way to trick everyone into thinking Zoom was broken so she
| didn't have to attend online lessons:
| https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/weird-news/eight-year-old-girl...
| Cthulhu_ wrote:
| TL;DR of that one: she activated a login lock by filling in
| the wrong password a couple of times.
|
| Zoom support should have been able to see "this account has
| been locked out due to too many login attempts" though, so
| that's a bit of a fail. And of course the login error should
| say as much.
|
| My job here is done; Captain Hindsight, away!
| lordnacho wrote:
| The other good one I saw was to change your name to
| "Connecting..."
| soperj wrote:
| Change your name to the teachers name and tell everyone
| that class is cancelled for the day.
| CTOSian wrote:
| lolz... thats really oldschool!! we did with at the BBS-
| era also we "echoed" this "Type +++ To go voice chat" was
| epic
| pmarreck wrote:
| Things that date me: Knowing the Hayes AT command set
| swasheck wrote:
| Yeah. At this point, social engineering is a hallmark of the
| Covid generation. In retrospect, Zoom hackery almost seemed
| like the inevitable outcome. We've shared good laughs with
| our kids over the antics "classmates" pulled because of zoom
| mindslight wrote:
| It's also taken this long to stack enough layers of digital
| abstractions that kid pranks aren't running afoul of the
| draconian CFAA.
| bgrainger wrote:
| Original Twitter thread:
| https://twitter.com/mfpiccolo/status/1360685864100237318
|
| (The article just recaps this without linking to it.)
| petercooper wrote:
| Good find. I knew I'd seen it in a better format somewhere
| before but Googling just found 101 articles.
| forbiddenvoid wrote:
| > but Googling just found 101 articles
|
| This is just what Google does now.
| petercooper wrote:
| Yes. Don't get me started. Quite frequently recently I've
| searched for answers to things and the "smart" answers
| they give are flat out wrong or dangerous because they
| misinterpreted a text. I should probably start to keep a
| list..
| sss111 wrote:
| time to build a search engine hall of fame website, or
| subreddit?
| temp0826 wrote:
| And I thought I was clever by editing the PDF results from
| someone else's test
| Confiks wrote:
| tl;dr: The test can only be spoofed if it isn't conducted
| properly, by not doing the step with the buffer solution [1] [2].
| You may even be able to unspoof the test by applying the buffer
| solution after the fact.
|
| [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CMcUzvrn75E
|
| [2] https://www.reuters.com/article/uk-factcheck-coca-cola-
| posit...
| Zachsa999 wrote:
| ++
| dahfizz wrote:
| > Fact check: Coca-Cola does not cause a positive COVID-19 test
|
| I find it very difficult to agree with that headline. We have
| lots of proof that putting coke on a covid test makes the test
| positive. Coca Cola unequivocally causes a positive result.
|
| That's like saying " X vulnerability in our software doesn't
| actually exist, because if any would-be hackers just followed
| the rules then they wouldn't be able to exploit the vuln".
| 908B64B197 wrote:
| They should buy a bag of tests and some soft drinks from
| their company and their competitors and just publish a page
| where they show that: Some soft drinks might break some tests
| making the results worthless.
|
| It's not a positive result (that implies the person has
| covid) it's that it damages the test. Like shorting the
| circuit of an electronic pregnancy test...
| RandallBrown wrote:
| "Coca-Cola causes positive COVID-19 test" would be a headline
| that to many would imply that simply drinking a coke is
| enough to cause you to get a positive test.
|
| I don't think that's what's happening.
| mannykannot wrote:
| For completeness with regard to unspoofing, it should be
| demonstrated that post-test application of the buffer does not
| reverse a truly positive test.
| sschueller wrote:
| Interesting how one group (children in school) are trying to fake
| a positive result while at the same time another group (club and
| party goers) are faking negative tests.
| danillonunes wrote:
| Here is the opportunity for someone to create some sort of
| marketplace where those two groups can sell tests to each
| other.
| ethbr0 wrote:
| As the saying goes, most children under 18 would test as
| sociopaths.
|
| Apparently that includes older club and party goers as well.
| DangitBobby wrote:
| Some teenagers have to go to pretty absurd lengths to escape
| the "structure" that has been imposed upon them. I'm sure
| that's where some of the "sociopathy" comes from. In my
| experience, though, adults are much less cooperative or
| agreeable in just about every scenario when compared to
| youngsters when it comes to not getting their way.
| drno123 wrote:
| Can official PCR test be somehow spoofed so I get Covid pass for
| the next 6 months?
| guilhas wrote:
| I thought the same, some juice up the nose, here I go...
| PenguinCoder wrote:
| I hope you're making a bad joke. Go get the vaccines to get the
| proof of vaccination cards.
| rgbbtc4life wrote:
| Why would anyone voluntarily get the clot shot which doesn't
| even work?
| CountDrewku wrote:
| The vaccine doesn't get you out of the tests everywhere yet.
| There are still places that require tests regardless of
| whether you've been vaccinated.
| 8note wrote:
| Those also don't care if you've had it before either
| flemhans wrote:
| Can be easily detected by licking the test hole to check if it
| tastes like coke / juice.
|
| Public officials can easily do this in order to bust the kids.
| alxlaz wrote:
| Wondering if there's a way to monetize this technique.
| gerdesj wrote:
| 8)
|
| A slightly safer way is to wash them:
|
| "Is there then a way to spot a fake positive test? The
| antibodies (like most proteins) are capable of refolding and
| regaining their function when they are returned to more
| favourable conditions. So I tried washing a test that had been
| dripped with cola with buffer solution, and sure enough the
| immobilised antibodies at the T-line regained normal function
| and released the gold particles, revealing the true negative
| result on the test."
| jorl17 wrote:
| Thanks for the laugh!!
| ethbr0 wrote:
| > _Can be easily detected by licking the test hole_
|
| Can't tell if you're serious or not, about licking a positive-
| indicating lateral flow test with potentially hot nasal
| mucus...
| Aditya_Garg wrote:
| He's definitely joking
| notduncansmith wrote:
| I lost it at the quoted text, haven't laughed this much in
| days. Classic HN sentence fragment of middlebrow dismissal
| with just enough obliviousness to social norms that it
| _might_ be satire, but with such deadpan delivery you just
| don't know. Pure gold.
| 271828182846 wrote:
| It is obviously a joke ... and that's about as obvious as
| it gets.
| ruined wrote:
| Can't tell if you're serious or not. Decent humor is
| pretty easy to spot. If something is unclear it's
| probably not a good joke
| ric2b wrote:
| No, that's just the US style of humour, where even a
| laugh-track is recommended to make sure no one misses the
| joke.
| ethbr0 wrote:
| If someone had said it to me in real life, I would have
| laughed.
|
| On the internet? Well, those are the people who eat Tide
| Pods...
|
| Ironically, phrasing was a pure product of pre-coffee
| morning + living in a part of the US where anti-vax
| comments are a daily occurrence, but it delights me I was
| responsible for a few smiles. (Including my own, re-
| reading it)
|
| And truth be told, "hot" emerged from morning fugue,
| after rejecting infected, live, and potentially hazardous
| as less accurate.
|
| Sadly, "tainted" did not occur to me first.
| dang wrote:
| Please let's not cross into nationalistic flamewar. Last
| thing we need here.
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
| useragent86 wrote:
| Of course not. On HN, joking is a very serious matter.
| Wheaties466 wrote:
| Only slightly related. But I went to the bahamas about a month
| ago. One of the "hooks" they used to make tourists feel
| comfortable with coming to their resorts was that if you got
| COVID ( tested positive on the way home test). They would either
| pay for a hotel and accommodations for a 10 day quarantine or fly
| you back in a private jet.
|
| All that being said when they administered the covid test on the
| way back to the US. I'm not even sure they stuck the Q-tip, what
| should qualify as, in my nose.
|
| Point is, its not just children trying to spoof covid tests.
| layoric wrote:
| That's ... so wrong but also doesn't surprise me at all. When
| the incentives don't align, I assume these hacks will be the
| default.
| tester34 wrote:
| coca cola and similar should be 18+ just like alcohol anyway
| ufo wrote:
| The method also works with other accidic drinks, such as
| lemonade.
| ackbar03 wrote:
| you must be fun at parties
| 1ris wrote:
| The comment does not contribute anything to the discussion.
| It's a just an ad hominem. Please don't do that.
| dageshi wrote:
| Make silly comments, get silly responses.
| blamazon wrote:
| I'll go one step further---all beverages with the sugar:water
| ratio of Coca Cola should be summarily banned.
|
| Diet soda, dunno what to do with that one.
| handrous wrote:
| I dunno about banned. Not practical, for one thing.
| Although... I dunno, I don't see bootlegging being as
| successful or widespread with soda as it was with alcohol.
| Regardless, probably not practical.
|
| But the state of things in which unlimited free refills of
| soda is the norm, 64+oz fountain soda servings are common,
| and 300+ calories of soda are often added on to "combo meals"
| for effectively just C/20-C/30 over the cost of the food as a
| "sweetener" (ha) to get people to choose a combo over a
| single item, is clearly not great. Something's out-of-whack.
| eplanit wrote:
| "Diet soda, dunno what to do with that one."
|
| Let people decide for themselves? Alcohol is unhealthy, so it
| should be banned. Hamburgers are high fat and environmentally
| impactful, so those should be banned, too. Let's not forget
| cigarettes....
|
| Yes people should opt to not consume unhealthy stuff, but how
| much authoritarianism do you really want?
| blamazon wrote:
| I would also like to imprison people who stand blocking
| moving walkways and escalators so I am comfortable with a
| high degree of authoritarianism as long as it is perfectly
| aligned with my wants.
|
| I realize this is not a very practical worldview.
| Cthulhu_ wrote:
| Banning all of those won't work - remember the Prohibition?
| - but there's plenty of discouragement things going on, at
| least on this side of the pond. Alcohol and tobacco are
| heavily taxed, tobacco can no longer be advertised for,
| displayed, or be in any kind interesting (bland packaging),
| and that's after they had to have big warnings about the
| health risks of smoking. And there's plans to introduce
| sugar taxes - which I would be more on board with if those
| taxes were used to subsidize and lower the price of 'good'
| food / essentials.
| boring_twenties wrote:
| In the US, we might not even need to tax sugar. We could
| try just ending the massive subsidies for it (and corn).
| briandear wrote:
| Why can't government just stay out of it? I don't recall
| electing a government to be my parents. Government should
| build roads and have a Navy but why should a government
| "encourage" healthy behaviors, etc. Are people unable to
| be adults on their own?
| handrous wrote:
| OTOH I'm not sure casting people into the wild to deal,
| all on their own, with megacorps employing hundreds or
| thousands dedicated to convincing people to make bad
| choices is a great idea, either.
|
| I'm not convinced Rugged Individualism and anything like
| the modern economy are compatible, in any kind of way in
| which the outcome of trying to have both is pleasant. It
| may be a "choose one" kind of situation.
| tomp wrote:
| The government is great for collective action necessary
| in situations that resemble the prisoner's dilemma, where
| incentives of individual agents lead them to take non-
| pareto-optimal decisions.
|
| Things like breaking up monopolies, mandating open access
| to infrastructure, and, yes, countering the effects of
| companies and advertisers manipulating us and exploiting
| our weaknesses.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _Let people decide for themselves? Alcohol is unhealthy,
| so it should be banned._
|
| Our societies socialise the costs of peoples' bad
| decisions, so it can't be 100% _laissez-faire_. That said,
| I disagree with the Prohibitionist instinct. Adding a tax
| that pays for the edge-case costs seems to make the most
| sense.
| rootusrootus wrote:
| I wonder if we'd need to tax the vegetarians for living
| too long and spending a lot of taxpayer dollars in their
| extended elderly years. Maybe we should actually
| subsidize the folks cheeseburgering their way to sudden
| cardiac death.
| briandear wrote:
| So much misinformation. Vegetarians don't live longer.
| And cheeseburger eaters don't die sooner in general.
|
| https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/do-vegetarians-live-
| longer...
| briandear wrote:
| Then let's stop socializing the costs of people's bad
| decisions.
| _0ffh wrote:
| For some reason it sometimes seems as if people would
| rather everybody is responsible for everybody else's bad
| decisions but never their own. It's crazy, I know.
| dogma1138 wrote:
| So all juices and smoothies? many of them have more sugar
| than Coke.... Even juices without any added sugar will have a
| ton of sugar in them if they come from sugar rich fruits.
| bena wrote:
| That's because a glass of juice isn't the equivalent of
| eating an orange, it's the equivalent of eating an orchard.
|
| An exaggeration, obviously, but it _is_ really bad. The
| number of fruits you have to eat to equal a glass of juice
| is significant.
| cogman10 wrote:
| Apple juice is about 100% sugar which is why you'll see it
| in so many "100% juice" products.
| Cthulhu_ wrote:
| Apple juice is about 10% sugar, I don't know why you're
| mentioning an improbable number.
|
| And here's the thing: Sugar is not a bad thing per se.
| It's overconsumption of it that's the issue. I'd rather
| have someone drink fruit juice than soda, but all in
| moderation.
| k3liutZu wrote:
| I think sugar is 100% sugar, hence "apple juice" can't be
| "100% sugar" since it has to have some water in it
| taylorius wrote:
| I thought that apple juice was a bit dry and grainy.
| scandinavian wrote:
| What's wrong with diet soda?
| unsigner wrote:
| There is strong suspicion artificial sweeteners mess up
| your gut biome, but it's not yet as established as the
| evils of sugar.
| valvar wrote:
| I'm not saying you're wrong, but which ones, and could
| you provide any sources? This is the first time I've
| heard that.
| Enginerrrd wrote:
| I've definitely read that it may play a role in
| decoupling the taste of sweet with satisfaction. That in
| turn may lead people to ultimately eat more before
| feeling satisfied, which is bad.
|
| Also, I think there might actually be some links to type
| II diabetes, but I'm skeptical of causation on that one.
| It's not implausible, but fully correcting for people
| already trying to reduce sugar intake sounds essentially
| impossible in that case.
| unsigner wrote:
| I'm not saying I'm right, as I'm not a biologist and this
| is just stuff I've seen (oft repeated) on the Internet,
| but:
|
| A search on Google Scholar shows multiple publications
| exploring the adverse effects on sweeteners on gut
| microbiome:
|
| https://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=artificial+sweetener
| s+e...
| axiosgunnar wrote:
| Possibly carcinogenic, but that's a big possibly, compared
| to the blatantly obvious harm caused by high-fructose corn
| syrup.
| valvar wrote:
| If you're talking about aspartame it's about as possibly
| carcinogenic as the moon landing was possibly faked.
| scandinavian wrote:
| That's news to me. Wikipedia also notes that Aspartame
| which is the sweetener used in most diet soda, has not
| been found to be carcinogenic with a bunch of citations.
|
| Or are you talking about other ingredients?
| bena wrote:
| He's not. Artificial sweeteners are one of the most
| demonized additives on the planet despite being one of
| the most studied. Because people are so often looking for
| a reason to get rid of them.
|
| Even the studies of them being bad for "getting used to
| sweetness" and thus making people more obese through
| compensatory over-eating are studies that rely on self-
| reporting and polling.
|
| When properly controlled, physics works as it always has
| and you can't magic mass or energy out of thin air.
| petercooper wrote:
| As part of improving my health, I came off of drinking
| sugary sodas a few years back and went sugar free. My
| dentist remained unimpressed saying that the sugar is only
| a small part of the story and really it's the _acid_ in
| soda that will cause me problems. I now drink a lot more
| water around any soda consumption to mitigate it slightly,
| but I gotta have _some_ bad habits..
| [deleted]
| Cthulhu_ wrote:
| > but I gotta have some bad habits..
|
| I think this should be normalized. In a lot of threads
| like this, there's some teetotalers that say all vices
| are bad and you should stop all of them at once.
|
| But vices are fine, in moderation. Having some soda every
| once in a while is fine. Drinking it by the gallon every
| day is problematic. But it's been normalized like that by
| the companies that produce them.
|
| Back in my day (shush kids, grandpa is talking), we got
| one, maybe two small glasses of soda and some crisps on a
| sunday. That was it.
| christkv wrote:
| People who moralize over vices tend to have some dirty
| little vices themselves.
| tester34 wrote:
| still being hypocrite doesnt make you wrong
| petercooper wrote:
| Here in the UK a lot of stores no longer sell caffeinated
| drinks to under 16s (it's not a law, but it's a common
| practice) so Red Bull et al. are out. I guess such a thing
| could be extended to sugary soda in general eventually. It's
| annoying, though, because if I want to buy one, I have to be
| "challenge 25" checked, but I guess it reduces my consumption
| as well!
| dcolkitt wrote:
| There's zero evidence whatsoever that caffeine is unhealthy
| for children. And given what we know about the health
| benefits in adult, coffee is most likely health promoting
| for children.
| viraptor wrote:
| It's not just the caffeine itself - that's one aspect.
| It's promoting the "use this to not sleep" recurring
| lifestyle choice, which some kids do come to rely on.
|
| This gets worse with Monster and others pushing the
| caffeine limits. (I remember a free Monster giveaway at
| uni - could not sleep for close to 30h - that stuff is
| not healthy)
| valvar wrote:
| Well, that's you. Everyone drank Monster at my uni and I
| don't think there were any reports of sleep issues. Of
| course it depends on your existing caffeine tolerance,
| and I guess most students consume quite a lot of
| caffeinated beverages, but if it was a common issue for
| those with low tolerance I'm sure we'd have noticed.
| [deleted]
| [deleted]
| kingosticks wrote:
| No, see evidence _regarding energy drinks_ in the
| references of https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?i
| d=10.1371/journal...
|
| > Several studies identified a strong, positive
| association between the use of energy drinks and higher
| odds of health-damaging behaviours, as well as physical
| health symptoms such as headaches, stomach aches,
| hyperactivity and insomnia
| fjtktkgnfnr wrote:
| What do you think about narcotics, should they be legal or
| not?
|
| One thing I noticed is that people who are for banning soda
| or alcohol are surprisingly for legalization of soft and hard
| drugs.
| hasmolo wrote:
| comparing addictions serves no meaningful purpose. people
| who want legal drugs still believe in a minimum age. i
| think that sugar should be seen as addictive as other drugs
| and the users must be old enough to be able to understand
| the risk of consuming.
| patentatt wrote:
| Banning is different from criminalization. So to make both
| legal but not easily obtainable seems consistent. Throwing
| someone in jail for life for possessing a 2-liter of coke
| seems wrong.
| sterlind wrote:
| anyone possessing 2-liters of coke is obviously a dealer.
| I'm all for decriminalizing the travel size cans, but we
| need party-size felonies for party-size containers.
| gala8y wrote:
| That's a joke that should be reality.
| Aachen wrote:
| I heard of someone whose parents just didn't give them sweet
| candies as a child and they never developed the craving. This
| is just a "I heard of one person ever" but since it's so
| rare, it's all I have to go on. I wonder if this would be
| reproducible.
| tester34 wrote:
| There's difference between "no sweeties" and regular cola
| drinking :P
| koolba wrote:
| My personal experience with that situation is that half the
| people grow up with no desire to eat sweets and the other
| half end up with an eating disorder. It's a gamble, but if
| you get lucky it'll pay off with a lifetime of stable blood
| sugar.
| bena wrote:
| I think it might be all in the how, not in the what.
|
| If you specifically deny your kids sugar and tell them
| it's the debbil and all that, you're gunning for the
| disorder when they finally rebel and try the forbidden
| carbohydrate.
|
| However, if it's just not a thing. You never point it
| out, you never mention it, you just don't have sugar
| around, then they're more geared for the dismissal of it.
| [deleted]
| dylan604 wrote:
| I've known many a parent that has tried this. However, the
| wheels fall off the bus as soon as the kid enters public
| schooling. The only parents that I've know to be successful
| are ones that home schooled their kids.
| Yoric wrote:
| I know a 9yo who never got candies from their parents and
| doesn't seem to like them so far.
| viraptor wrote:
| There's also a doesn't-like vs doesn't-like-the-quantity
| question. I could easily eat a whole chocolate bar in one
| go some time ago. Since then I reduced my sugar intake a
| lot. Now I feel like one row is overwhelming - 1-2 pieces
| is just fine.
| Cthulhu_ wrote:
| It's one outcome, the other is that the child feels like
| they've been repressed all their life and go on a sugar
| binge. I've heard similar stories about kids raised
| vegetarian discovering bacon and hamburgers for the first
| time.
| [deleted]
| 0xcafecafe wrote:
| My 3 year old hates sweets. Ice-cream, cakes and
| chocolates/candy are a hard no. So much so that he cried
| once my wife tricked him into tasting ice-cream. OTOH he
| loves ripe sweet tasting fruits so it is not aversion to
| sweet taste.We'll see how long this lasts...
| hkt wrote:
| My five year old is the same, although he had a
| "breakthrough" last year and now loves pan au chocolate.
| notdang wrote:
| Grew up in a country where no coca-cola was available. The
| sweets were given to kids only on special occasions.
|
| Now as an adult I am happily consuming great amount of Coca
| Cola, however never developed a taste for Americanized
| supermarket style sweet treats (Oreos, etc. )
| alpaca128 wrote:
| For me it was the opposite. Only got exposed to standard
| candy and chocolate here and there. I still love
| chocolate, and hate any kind of carbonated drink. It
| boggles my mind how people manage to drink that stuff
| voluntarily.
|
| But to each their own. I think this whole guessing the
| best diet for kids can go any way because it's just one
| of many factors. Though there are definitely known risk
| factors, e.g. how drunkenness at a young age greatly
| increases the risk of alcoholism later on.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| My parents didn't let us drink sweetened sodas except on
| special occasions, and never Coca-Cola for some reason. It
| massively helped, to the point that apart from a few high
| school and college years, I don't really drink them.
| ethbr0 wrote:
| Same. Milk was always an option.
|
| During college I availed myself of all-you-can-drink
| soda, and pretty much stopped drinking milk. Surprise,
| surprise the change (coupled with stress) resulted in
| some pretty serious and frequently recurring GI issues.
|
| Finally isolated the cause (docs were useless), went back
| on a 1+ glass of milk a day practice, and everything
| returned to normal.
|
| Since then, I pretty much cut soda out of my diet as
| well. IMHO, if we're looking at it from a caloric
| perspective, there are a lot more delicious things to
| spend 140 calories on.
| SketchySeaBeast wrote:
| I only drank coke on special occasions as a kid. When I
| finally had free reign I went on a coke binge for years and
| I still enjoy it, though I've limited the amount I consume.
| Given we're keyed towards enjoying sweet I don't think
| denying kids soda would mean they hate it on first contact
| - I'd imagine it'd be like kids who did get exposed to it -
| some hate it, some love it.
| criddell wrote:
| I'm glad my parents weren't like that. I have so many good
| memories of birthday cakes, sharing treats with my
| siblings, Hallowe'en, etc... where some sweet thing was a
| core part of the event.
|
| One of my favorite memories of my Dad is being out with
| just the two of us and we took a break for a surprise ice
| cream cone. Having him just to myself for a bit was pretty
| rare and to sit in a Dairy Queen somewhere for 30 minutes
| chatting and having ice cream was the absolute best.
| jtbayly wrote:
| But you could still do all of that with carrots. ... /s
| ;)
| nefitty wrote:
| On the topic of parents, I'm second generation immigrant.
| All of my family grew up in other countries, in poverty.
| None of them have ever developed cavities and such. I've
| never seen my parents ever express any craving for
| sweets.
|
| I once quit sugar for 6 months. It was harder than
| quitting alcohol, nicotine or caffeine. My first super-
| sweet treat after those 6 months was a donut and it
| almost made me vomit on the first bite. The dopamine rush
| quickly overwhelmed my physical aversion.
| effingwewt wrote:
| I remember going through that after basic training and
| AIT(Ft Sill, Oklahoma- absolute Hell). As a
| kid/teenager/young adult I was very active in gymnastics,
| Tae Kwon Do, Tang Soo Do, skateboarding, rollerblading,
| and I watched what I ate. While in basic I was losing a
| lot of weight(super fast metabolism) so they shoved
| sugar/carbs down my throat in basic- made me drink soda,
| eat burgers, donuts and pizza in the mess hall (also my
| platoon hated me over it because they weren't allowed to
| touch any of it, and here I was so full I'm gonna puke
| and here comes a Drill Sergeant who slides me another
| donut which I now have to eat). It sucked because I had
| to run 2x per day as opposed to once a day/every other
| day, so it felt like I had a lump of cement in my
| stomach. The side stitches give me chills to this day.
| Puking while running is _not_ fun, and then what was the
| point of filling me to bust if I don 't get to digest a
| quarter of it?
|
| Anyway, by the time I got to AIT I was so happy to not
| have to touch any of it, I didn't. So while my classmates
| went off-post on weekends and got fat on garbage I went
| out and had fun, but at well at the mess hall.
|
| By the time I was out of the service (2yrs) I hadn't
| touched sweets/caffeine/crap in almost that whole time. I
| remember being able to taste the caffeine in sodas(if
| you've ever drunk ginseng you probably know what it
| tastes like), and they felt like straight syrup.
|
| Somewhere along the way I had a girlfriend who got me
| back into them, and they just became a part of my life
| again.
|
| Now, here I am, 40, getting rid of them again. But now
| it's worse because I really enjoy my morning coffee and
| knowing I will be replacing it with running (which I used
| to love until the US Army), doesn't help my motivation
| much.
|
| But yea, quitting sugar _and_ caffeine. Smoking
| cigarettes wasn 't this hard to quit :(
| criddell wrote:
| Just out of curiosity, whey are you quitting caffeine?
| EugeneOZ wrote:
| To resurrect the bootleggers!
| [deleted]
| swasheck wrote:
| Have an upvote for your tongue-in-cheek social commentary.
|
| Sugar is more addicting than alcohol and it definitely is mood-
| altering, though it seems the effects are more subtle and less
| severe than alcohol
| fjtktkgnfnr wrote:
| The only thing legal for kids to eat should be spinach and
| brocolli.
|
| Parents should be jailed if they fed them cakes.
| TroisM wrote:
| I think we should only be allowed a slurpie issued by the
| government that contains everything we need... no other food or
| drinks, except water.
| Cthulhu_ wrote:
| Soylent Green is people!
| dylan604 wrote:
| No, Brawndo. It's got everything the body craves.
| Electrolytes!
| TroisM wrote:
| Monkey Chow should work... someone tried it for a little
| bit: https://www.angryman.ca/monkey.html
| dang wrote:
| " _Eschew flamebait. Avoid unrelated controversies and generic
| tangents._ "
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
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