Virginia Releases COVID-19 Exposure App Based on Apple and Google API

[Elwe]

Its surprising, ineffective and wasteful, to have 50 different apps made with different criteria, etc. instead of a single one by the federal government, I think of city clusters that stretch two or more states, like the Boston-Washington Northeast corridor... its not like people don't commute from NJ to NY, from Delaware to DC, also... domestic air travel... does different apps using the exposure API by Apple/Google communicate between them?

If you really think about it, from a scientific stand point, there should be one global app for this... maybe developed and run by the UN and promoted by national governments... of course, you get politics in the mix and we have what we have now... the US out of the WHO, the Chinese withholding data, some national entities lying and denying the pandemic, etc...

Yes to a number of your points. I think the central reasoning arises out of our (the US's) long history with concepts of federalism. I've observed that many people--including people who were raised abroad but also people raised in major population centers in the US--don't adequately appreciate how rooted notions of the highly layered patchwork of shared power and areas of authority are. And the lines between city, county, state, regional, and federal authority are always changing by legislation or judicial degree. Efficiency has not been the overriding concern for most of our history with regard to healthcare . . . anyone remember the number and breadth of fights over "Obamacare"? . . . or any number of other areas, actually. We are about to be hit over the head in three months with considerations surrounding the proper role of people appointed to the Electoral College, especially in a likely close presidential election. The Supreme Court of the US just had to issue a ruling dealing with this subject, as they were convinced they needed to preempt some of the possibilities.

Anyway, there is next-to-zero chance that local leaders in Mobile will see COVID-related things the same way was local leaders in Manhattan. Personally, I applaud VDH's approach to put privacy and standardization on Google's and Apple's platforms at the forefront. I can easily count five other examples in the news where local or national leaders somewhere in the US or Europe have decided to go a different way because they believe they know their peoples' needs better than Google and Apple. Several of those are, apparently, still working on getting their apps out, though. Most goverments don't have deep benches Android and iOS developers, it seems.

 

[GTDaveMac]

How does this get rolled out? Do we get an OS update with this?

It's been in the OS for awhile. All you have to do is download the app and allow access to the tracking API.

 

[verpeiler]

they Should make it mandatory to have the app on your phone when you take a test. Every positive result should be put in the phone by default. The server should ping every user 3 times a day to see if the app is on their phone and working. 3 fails and a fine.

Finally, anyone who uses a bar / restraunt needs to have the app on their phone.

i think all the above would work pretty well and every one feel safer.

First, it’s not there to feel safer. It helps to identify clusters. And forcing it on people will just lead to protesting... all these anti-mask idiots would feel reinforced in their belief that it’s a conspiracy.

 

[Apple Freak]

I'm still confused on how contact tracing helps, it's like one is just following the virus around. Sounds more like being reactive instead of proactive.

I can see how mask mandates and social distancing help someone from not getting the virus in the first place which, to me, has some real benefit. If only everyone followed these mandates and didn't think the government was trying to infringe on their rights whenever they are required to wear a mask at a place of business.

 

[GTDaveMac]

I'm still confused on how contact tracing helps, it's like one is just following the virus around. Sounds more like being reactive instead of proactive.

I can see how mask mandates and social distancing help someone from not getting the virus in the first place which, to me, has some real benefit. If only everyone followed these mandates and didn't think the government was trying to infringe on their rights whenever they are required to wear a mask at a place of business.

It's not an all-encompassing solution,... it is designed to enable people that may have been exposed but are not showing symptoms to quarantine themselves until they can be tested and/or isolate for 14 days.

 

[laz232]

Its surprising, ineffective and wasteful, to have 50 different apps made with different criteria, etc. instead of a single one by the federal government, I think of city clusters that stretch two or more states, like the Boston-Washington Northeast corridor... its not like people don't commute from NJ to NY, from Delaware to DC, also... domestic air travel... does different apps using the exposure API by Apple/Google communicate between them?

If you really think about it, from a scientific stand point, there should be one global app for this... maybe developed and run by the UN and promoted by national governments... of course, you get politics in the mix and we have what we have now... the US out of the WHO, the Chinese withholding data, some national entities lying and denying the pandemic, etc...

Hi - I'm based in Northern Europe and DO NOT want a global app for this.

Having foreign governments have complete (1m) precision on individuals interactions is extremely dangerous!

As per usual - this is not about you - but such info will show who can be bribed and blackmailed - exposes who is working for which agencies etc. and therefore allows for a complete undermining of democracy for half a generation (duration of average employment at a company / government level post)

I have worked on international research - having organizations like WHO involved will make this a mess of committee design in any case.
And finally I wonder as to the value of these apps - in my country the uptake ended up being very low - despite high trust levels in the government - and very few epidemiologists have weighed in on the actual effectiveness of such apps.

The seem to mostly be sold as a technological wet dream to desperate and scientifically illiterate government bureaucrats.

 

[CarlJ]

What is to stop someone from being a major ass and using these apps to falsely spread positive results?

Gee, it’s a shame the designers didn’t think of this. Or maybe they did, and you need a one-time code from issued from the agency/authority controlling the central database of positive-tested anonymous identifiers, via the lab/agency where you got the test, in order to make yourself as having tested positive, in the app.

 

[rlhamil]

they Should make it mandatory to have the app on your phone when you take a test. Every positive result should be put in the phone by default. The server should ping every user 3 times a day to see if the app is on their phone and working. 3 fails and a fine.

Finally, anyone who uses a bar / restraunt needs to have the app on their phone.

i think all the above would work pretty well and every one feel safer.

Sorry, but I'd rather risk a high body count (even if I end up being one of the fatalities myself) than go for such authoritarian approaches.

 

[boss.king]

I'm still confused on how contact tracing helps, it's like one is just following the virus around. Sounds more like being reactive instead of proactive.

I can see how mask mandates and social distancing help someone from not getting the virus in the first place which, to me, has some real benefit. If only everyone followed these mandates and didn't think the government was trying to infringe on their rights whenever they are required to wear a mask at a place of business.

Being able to quickly identify who may have come into contact with an infected person makes it a lot easier to contain. It's absolutely a reactive procedure, but seeing as some people can't be trusted to follow the proactive measures such as wearing a mask and socially distancing themselves, reactive measures are necessary.

 

[CarlJ]

I'm still confused on how contact tracing helps, it's like one is just following the virus around. Sounds more like being reactive instead of proactive.

I can see how mask mandates and social distancing help someone from not getting the virus in the first place which, to me, has some real benefit. If only everyone followed these mandates and didn't think the government was trying to infringe on their rights whenever they are required to wear a mask at a place of business.

You need both. If you could stock up everyone with a month’s worth of supplies, lock everyone in their homes for a month, we could kill this thing off. But we’ll never do that here. No one will ever do that. The Chinese came close, in the original province, but even there, there were some essential people out of their home to deliver food and such.

Given that that approach won’t work, you protect the public as well as you can, with work-from-home, and masks, and social distancing. And when people do get sick, you try to isolate them as quickly possible, and track down everyone they’ve been in contact with - this is contact tracing. This isn’t a binary choice. It isn’t “either masks/distancing or contact tracing”, it’s defense-in-depth.

To keep things from burning down, you don’t choose between cleaning up fire hazards and having a fire department, you do both.

To avoid traffic deaths, you don’t choose between seat belts and airbags, you use both.

To fight COVID-19, we need both passive/proactive measures and active/reactive measures. Masks / social distancing / work-from-home AND contact tracing.

And this damn virus is going to stick around at least as long as we have idiots who think it isn’t a big deal, or that wearing a mask is an assault on their freedoms (but apparently wearing pants isn’t a similar assault on their freedoms, worthy of similar protest, even though that’s also mandated by law and social contract).

Unfortunately, in the US we also have a bunch of state governments who see contact tracing and exposure notification apps as an either/or choice - they’re not in competition, they complement each other, with different strengths and weaknesses. We need both.

And, in the US, we’re having to do all this at the state level, because the federal government has largely abdicated responsibility for handling it. The response would be much better handled (if competently done) at the federal level, rather than having 50 states forced to reinvent wheels and bid against each other for supplies. Yet this is the situation we find ourselves in.

 

[512ke]

A great if belated response from a State to solve a problem that's International.

Look at a country like Spain (where I have family). There the heavy hand of govt is everywhere. You can't travel in between cities if one has a big infection rate. The govt might slap you with a fine of 100 Euros in some regions if you don't wear a mask. If the Rona is peaking, you can only go out for an hour a day to exercise and shop.

It would be like the USA saying early on, hey New Yorkers, you can't drive to Florida and infect everybody there. No way. Roads are closed. Hey freedom lovers, you don't wear a mask? Well you're getting a ticket you have pay...

That would be terrible -- but then again, our rates would be down. Our economy could at least limp along. Some small businesses could survive. It'd be Economy is Open Lite.

I fear our "my freedom" approach is going to result in a Covid Cornucopia through August, September, October, November, December, January, February... 'cause there's no Economic Recovery without Covid Under Control.

 

[CarlJ]

Why the hell would this be state wise? No one in the US crosses State borders?

Because in the US the federal government has abdicated responsibility. It falls upon the states to each take care of this on their own.

 

[verpeiler]

Hi - I'm based in Northern Europe and DO NOT want a global app for this.

Having foreign governments have complete (1m) precision on individuals interactions is extremely dangerous!

You know, this is complete nonsense. You can’t be identified and you stay completely anonymous. And since the app doesn’t track location data your other points are irrelevant.

And this coming from a German, we value privacy as you know

 

[CarlJ]

Right now the worst hit part of Virginia is Hampton Roads where unfortunately this will not catch on, as even masks are not being adhered to that well.

In some moments, I think we’ve finally encountered a virus that targets stupidity.

There are well-known simple practices to avoid and ultimately wipe this virus out, but there are large contingents of idiots who refuse to follow scientific / epidemiological advice because they don’t believe in science (guess what, the virus doesn’t care if you choose not to believe in science) or because conspiracy theories, or because “muh freedoms!” The virus may long-term end up weeding out some of these people.

 

[Hodar1]

Boss has daughter attempt to move into the dorm. Manditory COVID-19 Test. Came back positive. Hence, entire family quarantine for 14 days. 2 successive tests later showed that the first test was a FALSE POSITIVE

This neither unique nor uncommon. So what good is a tracking system, when a single FALSE POSITIVE creates panic and quarantine for peripherally affected people - over 14 days back in time - for 14 days forward in time?

And we are talking about a disease with only a 99.5% chance of surviving

 

[C DM]

Boss has daughter attempt to move into the dorm. Manditory COVID-19 Test. Came back positive. Hence, entire family quarantine for 14 days. 2 successive tests later showed that the first test was a FALSE POSITIVE

This neither unique nor uncommon. So what good is a tracking system, when a single FALSE POSITIVE creates panic and quarantine for peripherally affected people - over 14 days back in time - for 14 days forward in time?

And we are talking about a disease with only a 99.5% chance of surviving

Don't throw the baby out with the bathwater - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[cmaier]

Boss has daughter attempt to move into the dorm. Manditory COVID-19 Test. Came back positive. Hence, entire family quarantine for 14 days. 2 successive tests later showed that the first test was a FALSE POSITIVE

This neither unique nor uncommon. So what good is a tracking system, when a single FALSE POSITIVE creates panic and quarantine for peripherally affected people - over 14 days back in time - for 14 days forward in time?

And we are talking about a disease with only a 99.5% chance of surviving

What good is it? It’s very good. The problem would be false NEGATIVES, not false positives.

 

[verpeiler]

Boss has daughter attempt to move into the dorm. Manditory COVID-19 Test. Came back positive. Hence, entire family quarantine for 14 days. 2 successive tests later showed that the first test was a FALSE POSITIVE

This neither unique nor uncommon. So what good is a tracking system, when a single FALSE POSITIVE creates panic and quarantine for peripherally affected people - over 14 days back in time - for 14 days forward in time?

And we are talking about a disease with only a 99.5% chance of surviving

Uh, you don’t have to quarantine for 14 days. You make a test and then wait for the result.

And again:
- the chance of death is still unknown, which leads to
- older people or people with diseases are more likely to die
- you can infect other people (and kill them)
- and ****ing again: it’s not just about death, you can be very sick after an infection with lung, kidney or even brain damage.

 

[123]

I'm still confused on how contact tracing helps, it's like one is just following the virus around. Sounds more like being reactive instead of proactive.

The incubation period of the secondary case (infected by primary case who gets tested because of symptoms) helps here. As you can see, there is not much time: Person has symptoms, waits, decides to get a test, waits, receives the result -> tracing starts. 3 days can easily pass from symptom onset. Therefore, people should get tested immediately, and the test result should be made available without delay (hours instead of days). Automatic tracing is obviously much better than manual because no additional time is lost. You can prevent the bigger part of the secondary case's infectiousness by letting them know in time. Also, some secondary cases can even get tested before they have symptoms, meaning that there's a good chance to break that chain eventually.

 

[xraydoc]

Installed and activated (VA resident). Agree it should be nation-wide and should have been out a month or more ago, but at least its something.

FYI, the Virginia State Government just sent an email to all state employees about the app for both iOS and Android encouraging everyone to install it, use it and post about it on social media.

 

[davxdcampbell]

I’m in VA and am trying to get it working. I’m getting a domain error 14 when I attempt to enable the required settings. I wonder if it’s because I’m on the iOS 14 public beta (using a XS). I didn’t have any issues installing the app and enabling settings on my work phone (iPhone 8 running 13.6). Weird.

 

[CarlJ]

Hi - I'm based in Northern Europe and DO NOT want a global app for this.

Having foreign governments have complete (1m) precision on individuals interactions is extremely dangerous!

Go. Read. The. Damn. Spec. It does not do, and cannot do, the things that you fearfully imagine it does.

 

[GTDaveMac]

I’m in VA and am trying to get it working. I’m getting a domain error 14 when I attempt to enable the required settings. I wonder if it’s because I’m on the iOS 14 public beta (using a XS). I didn’t have any issues installing the app and enabling settings on my work phone (iPhone 8 running 13.6). Weird.

Needs beta 4.

 

[manu chao]

It's been in the OS for awhile. All you have to do is download the app and allow access to the tracking API.

From the 31 July blogpost Secondempire linked to:

Since the Exposure Notification API was publicly released in May, we’ve spoken with dozens of public health authorities to understand how the API could be improved to help them better manage the COVID-19 pandemic while preserving privacy. Based on this feedback, we recently launched an update to the API, which includes the following changes:

• The API now supports interoperability between countries, following feedback from governments that have launched Exposure Notification apps.

On iOS, the API was introduced with iOS 13.5, released in May. The last iOS update was 13.6, released on July 15. Are we supposed to assume that when a July 31 blogpost refers to a recently launched update to the API, that the July 15 OS update contains those changes (despite this not having been mentioned when 13.6 was released)?

 

[manu chao]

Boss has daughter attempt to move into the dorm. Manditory COVID-19 Test. Came back positive. Hence, entire family quarantine for 14 days. 2 successive tests later showed that the first test was a FALSE POSITIVE

This neither unique nor uncommon. So what good is a tracking system, when a single FALSE POSITIVE creates panic and quarantine for peripherally affected people - over 14 days back in time - for 14 days forward in time?

And we are talking about a disease with only a 99.5% chance of surviving

Better than quarantining the whole country (or state or city).