Hacker News new | ask | show | jobs
by freshpots 1073 days ago
But aren't we talking about rapid tests? There is a big difference between false positives when it comes to PCR vs rapid tests. False positives with rapid tests are known to be far less prevalent.
1 comments

Other types of test are calibrated against PCR tests. That's why the article says:

"[...] finds the largest study to compare home rapid tests with gold-standard PCR tests"

PCR is assumed to be the truth to which rapid tests should aspire.

> False positives with rapid tests are known to be far less prevalent.

That's probably true if you use a normal definition of false positive, but under the intellectual framework public health uses you can't say this because you can't have less prevalent than zero.