Absurd experience under lockdown in Shanghai: ‘I was dragged to the cabin when I was negative for nucleic acid, and turned positive when I came out’ – BBC News

Will the occasional positive be a false positive? Or detected a problem? Or was it previously infected and later recovered? Li Yan wanted to review the positive result, but no one paid attention. Under Shanghai’s strict implementation of the “social zero” policy, she was taken to the makeshift hospital that day.

At present, Shanghai has been closed for more than a month, and many residents have been unable to go out or leave the community for more than a month. The official stressed that the goal of “social zero” must be achieved as soon as possible. Its purpose is to strictly control the invisible transmission chain in society, keeping patients and those who may be at risk of transmission in a controlled state, without considering issues such as economic and social costs. As a result, various departments seem to be trying their best to control the flow of people in order to complete a set target or political task, and conduct compulsory nationwide testing regardless of residents’ work and rest time. As long as the nucleic acid results are positive, they will be sent to the Fangcang shelter hospital for isolation.

Li Yan is not alone in having doubts about the positive test result. On the social media Weibo, it is not uncommon for people to be sent to the cabin for no reason.

A netizen who signed JAKEBAEK is a resident of Pudong New Area in Shanghai. He posted on May 2 that after he came out of the shelter and returned to the community, he had a nucleic acid test on the seventh day and was notified that the result was Fuyang. He self-tested the antigen many times, and the results showed a bar. He asked for a review and was told that he could be sent to the hospital to measure the Ct value. However, she didn’t know that she was taken to the cabin until she got in the car.

“Why don’t you give me a review, take me to the hospital to measure the Ct value and then decide whether to isolate me or not? In case I am not contagious or I am a false positive, I am tricked into the cabin and get infected again? Who is responsible? ” The Shanghai resident wrote. Since he didn’t know he was going to the cabin, he didn’t even bring the medicines and clothes he needed every day. Under this post, many people reported experiencing similar experiences.

There is also a family of five in Shanghai who tested positive at the end of March, but could not be admitted due to limited space in the square cabin, and were temporarily isolated at home. Half a month later, 5 people recovered by themselves, and the nucleic acid test was negative. However, at this time, Shanghai has introduced differentiated prevention and control measures at different levels, which are divided into prevention areas, management and control areas, and sealing and control areas according to the degree of risk. As long as it is positive within 7 days, it belongs to the closed control area, and the 7-day closed management is implemented, and residents cannot leave their homes.

So, under the pressure of some people in the community, the family could not stand the pressure and agreed to be transported to the shelter.

“During the period when we were infected, the government announced a lot of policies, but it did not say that the patients who had been diagnosed, those who were quarantined at home and had no time to be transported, and those who recovered themselves, how can we prove that ‘I have recovered’.” Residents wrote on their WeChat public account.

She also said that among the positive people found in the community at the same time, they were not sent to the shelter because there was no car to pick up or there was not enough space. Many people recovered at home but could not prove that they were not infectious. “If you don’t enter the square cabin, no one will recognize it. If you keep wearing the positive hat, which day will you be a head?”

After arriving at the shelter, Li Yan from Huangpu District also called the CDC in the district several times, hoping to complain about her situation, but no one answered. She also asked the medical staff in the cabin to give feedback. The other party told her: “You have already come here, and you can go out after testing two negatives.”

“I’m negative myself, isn’t the probability of infection very high?” Li Yan asked rhetorically. There are nearly 500 patients living in the cabin where she lives, and she has to take off her mask in the enclosed space when drinking water and eating.

“You protect yourself,” the medical staff responded to Li Yan. Apart from that, there were no other measures. At this time, Li Yan only felt that the other party was cold and irresponsible.

The environment in her cabin is relatively good, and there is no shortage of food and basic materials in some cabins. But, “being sent in in an extremely uncertain state was really frightening, and I was suffocating at night,” she said.

Just one day after Li Yan arrived in the cabin, one of her neighbors said in the community’s social group that his nucleic acid test was positive on April 30, but later the CDC called him, saying that he had made a mistake and that he The Ct value is 39.3.

The full name of Ct value is cycle number threshold, which is a professional term used by professionals to detect the virus content in samples. A simple understanding is that the smaller the Ct value, the more virus content in the sample and the stronger the infectivity. According to China’s latest national standard, as long as the value is greater than or equal to 35, it means there is no risk of infection.

“That is to say, they still use the original standard to test for nucleic acid, so how many people are only positive because the value is wrong. It’s scary,” said Li Yan’s neighbor.

Coincidentally, a Shanghai resident with the online name of MarowizLILY is currently quarantined in a shelter on Hangjin Road. She posted on Weibo on May 2 for help, hoping to apply for two nucleic acid results to be reviewed and to be discharged from the hospital. She said that her nucleic acid results on April 29 and May 1 were both positive, and the Ct values ​​were 37 and 39.23, respectively.

“What is the standard Ct value for nucleic acid testing? Why does the Ct meet the standard and the result shows positive? Why can’t I appeal? Why don’t the negative patients go home?” the resident asked.

In fact, as early as March 15 this year, China issued the ninth edition of the notice on the new crown diagnosis and treatment plan. One of the major changes is to clarify that the nucleic acid detection Ct value of the convalescent infected person is greater than or equal to 35 to be discharged or released from isolation. standard. Previously, China has always determined that the standard for a negative nucleic acid test for the new crown is a Ct value greater than 40.

Zhang Wenhong, director of the Department of Infectious Diseases at Huashan Hospital Affiliated to Fudan University, explained that patients with COVID-19 generally can reach a Ct value of 35 after staying in the hospital for about 10 days, but it may take several months to reach a value above 35. “It is meaningless in terms of treatment, and it is extremely unreasonable to keep him in the hospital if he is not infectious.”

According to the statements of the above-mentioned residents, there may have been problems in the implementation of the new standard, resulting in the fact that the Ct value reached the standard but could not be discharged from the hospital due to a positive nucleic acid result. Some people also questioned whether some CDCs in Shanghai recently raised the Ct value standard in order to achieve the zero-clearing task.

“If nothing else, I am the victim of the increase in Ct (standard),” Li Yan speculated. At this point, it was impossible for her to know her Ct value, so she had no choice but to stay in the shelter for a few nights. After three negative nucleic acid tests, she returned home on May 3.

After returning from the cabin, the bad luck is not over yet, and things are developing in the direction that Li Yan is most worried about.

She started to have a low-grade fever in the afternoon of the day she left the cabin, and the temperature reached 38.5 degrees the next day, “like a knife cut in her throat”. When the antigen was self-tested again, two obvious bars appeared.

“All of this suddenly makes sense,” Li Yan suddenly realized. She had no symptoms before going to the cabin, and she tested negative many times. She also tested negative many times in the cabin, but she started to get sick after leaving the cabin. She speculated that she was infected in the cabin to a large extent.

“It feels humiliating, but it’s not caused by the disease,” Li Yan said. “The whole thing is not up to your personal will, and there is no place to appeal or reason.”

While in the cabin, Li Yan also found that, unlike the situation outside the cabin, the nucleic acid results of the residents in the cabin could not be found on mobile phones, and they had to be searched one by one on dozens of pages of paper posted on the wall. The paper lists the bed, name, nucleic acid results, the interval between tests, and whether the discharge conditions are met. When the results came out, many residents swarmed up, looking forward to seeing their negative results and getting out of the cabin as soon as possible.

“Isn’t this another risk of gathering people?” Li Yan said with emotion. “I really feel that ordinary people are particularly pitiful and have no dignity at all.”

She also saw people in protective clothing playing the red old song “Sing to the Motherland” loudly in the cabin, attracting many patients to gather for video, which made her feel “extremely ridiculous”.

Li Yan now has new concerns. “I’m worried that when I do the nucleic acid test again, my body will not fully recover. If the result is positive, I may have to go for a walk in the cabin again. This is what I’m most afraid of now,” she said in a hoarse voice.