As reported by Daniel Horowitz at Blaze Media, the new CDC guidance for “COVID-19 vaccine breakthrough case investigation” – meaning people who tested positive after getting vaccinated – says PCR tests should be set at 28 CT or lower. The stated reason for the 28 CT maximum is to avoid false positives on people who have been vaccinated, which would discourage acceptance of the vaccines.
This is another example of ‘following the science’ only when it suits a political purpose; to wit, CDC is not recommending the lower threshold for anyone else being tested. False positives must be avoided to encourage vaccinations, but false positives to prevent children from attending school or maintain other government restrictions seem OK with CDC.
Last summer, the New York Times reported that CTs above 34 almost never detect live virus but most often, dead nucleotides that are not contagious. The Sentinel found that many private labs in Kansas used thresholds of 38 and 40, and another one in Lenexa potentially at 45. The state lab at the Kansas Department of Health initially used a 42 CT on its most commonly performed test; on January 7, they reduced it to 35.
Questions posed to KDHE about their current CT level have not been answered at press time.
Horowitz quotes former New York Times reporter Alex Berenson as saying a standard of 28 CT applied to the general testing regime would preclude as many as 90% of cases from being recorded.
Polymerase chain reaction (PCR) tests, the most commonly used tests to diagnose COVID, amplify tiny strands of virus in cycles. There’s an inverse relationship to viral load and contagion and the number of cycles necessary to detect the virus. So a lower number of cycles necessary to detect the virus indicates a higher viral load and infectiousness. A higher number of cycles indicates less viral load, and in some cases, it may indicate dead virus from an infection that is not currently contagious.
A 28 CT means the tested material has been amplified, or doubled, 28 times.
Horowitz puts the situation into perspective.
“We’ve watched throughout the country as entire families are forced into quarantine because one classmate of a child tests positive for the virus without exhibiting any symptoms. Lives destroyed without any due process or evidentiary standards that they are even infected.”
Now “the CDC has suddenly discovered the power of cycle thresholds on PCR testing in determining whether the positive results are real or meaningful. But here’s the problem: Where is this guidance when it comes to non-vaccinated people?”
The Sentinel will continue to press KDHE and county health departments to ask if they will voluntarily reduce their thresholds to 28 CT for all tests.