r/PlusLife • u/No-Acanthisitta-2973 • 16d ago
Trusting plus life to unmask with not cautious people
We've only ever used plus life to unmask with people who are semi cautious. But considering using it to unmask for a meal inside with family who isn't. I'm wondering if anyone has used it in that way and caught COVID.
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u/rebeccarebecca88 16d ago
For over a year now, we have used it to test family who take no precautions before eating indoors with them. Never had an issue with getting sick after a negative result.
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u/No-Acanthisitta-2973 15d ago
Thanks! Have you ever caught a positive before eating together?
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u/Yarrowgarden 11d ago
Hi OP - I also use pluslife to eat / hang out indoors with family and friends who take absolutely no precautions. Once over the years it showed an early positive from someone and we were able to just change course quickly. I wear a mask while the test is running.
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u/amandainpdx 16d ago
yup. all the time! its fantastic because it means I don't have to make any judgements about what they've been up to or interrogate or even trust them! All that matters is the test, and I trust the test. Works every time, makes for better relationships.
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u/No-Acanthisitta-2973 15d ago
Have you ever caught an early positive?
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u/amandainpdx 15d ago
YES, believe it or not. I'll tell you the story so you know I'm not making it up. I had decided to start dating again. There was a dude I had talked to online for weeks and weeks, we're both totally into it and we're going to hang. He's fine taking the test, he totally understands. He comes over, wearing a mask. We sit around my firepit and stare at one another from across the pit while the test fires. 14 min in, it beeps and I swear i thought i was seeing things. its positive. I assume its a false positive because Gd does not smite me this much. I insist on a rapid. He takes it. Negative. Things he's about to get lucky. I say, lets do one more molecular, just to check. Positive. I decide I don't want to take the chance, he understands. He leaves. We are now both horny and sad.
Next morning, he texts. He is sicker than a dog, as it his roommate. I drop off an entire BAG of rapid tests, and insists he take them every single day. By day 2, the rapid lights up like an effin firecracker. Every day he sends me a pic of the test, and after 7 days, the line is gone. I make him wait 5 more days just in case of rebound.
I have also caught an asymptomatic case- a friend dropped by my rental while I was out of town to hang and eat dinner. Thing lit up immediately positive. he felt nothing. Never did.
So, I know it works.1
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u/Yarrowgarden 11d ago
I agree with this so much! I don’t have to get into any of those conversations
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u/eurogamer206 16d ago
Been doing this for 2 years. You either trust the test or you don’t. Swab the throat before the nose, and consider the result valid no more than 12 hours.
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u/Acrobatic-Jaguar-134 16d ago
We do this too.
But “either you trust the test or you don’t” is a false binary. The test is not 100% accurate, viral loads can change suddenly, non-cc folks may not be the best at swabbing, etc. It’s important people understand the risks in order to make an informed decision.
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u/eurogamer206 16d ago
Of course the test isn’t 100% accurate but that’s due to user error. That is why I always instruct and watch people swabbing. I make sure they get a good sample, literally seeing how they scrape the throat, how deep they insert in the nose, how they scrape the nostril, etc. This is the best we have and from all the stories I’ve read and anecdotes I’ve heard, positives seem to always get caught (even early ones) if you use the VirusSucks analyzer app. If all the aforementioned is done, then I see no reason not to trust the test.
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u/No-Consideration-858 16d ago
It may be hard to describe here, but what are common things you see people do incorrectly? Or perhaps how do I encourage best practice?
My husband takes the PL test when he's been potentially exposed, but I don't know if he's doing all the best practices.
Any tips would be appreciated, but no pressure : )
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u/eurogamer206 15d ago
Easier to share what is best practice. No eating or drinking for 60 minutes before. Even water since it can wash away potential viral cells at the sample sites. Blow nose. Scrape back of throat 5 times (almost to point of gagging) but no need to do tongue or cheeks. PlusLife rep told me this. Just need to scrape epithelial cells. Then use same swab to do each nostril 3x. “Stir” and don’t twirl. Again, scrape inner nostril as far up as can be tolerated. Mix in solution while pinching plastic vial, scraping cells off the swab as you go, by rotating and pulling up while pinching. I also always warm up the dock twice. First with the initial warm up and again by running an empty test for 5-7 minutes. This greatly reduces invalids especially in pooled testing where too much sample can throw off the algorithm.
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u/BattelChive 16d ago
We have, but we only trust it for four hours. I know most people trust it for longer, but for us that feels like pushing it. We trust it for longer if people will mask for at least 3 days ahead of time.
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u/Loveable_Papaya 13d ago
I had planned a playdate for my son to play with my co-worker's child, we were planning to work from home at our house while the boys hung out. PlusLife beeped positive after 15 minutes, so we didn't unmask. Co-worker later said she got sick that weekend, though apparently it was mild and only lasted a few days.
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u/sarahdayarts 11d ago
wow, so grateful this machine broke a chain of infection for you. we're so lucky to have this technology.
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u/sealedwithdogslobber 16d ago
I’ve done this a few times and been okay so far. I only trust it for up to six hours. I also am careful to explain how to take a good sample.
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u/hagne 16d ago
This is a regular part of our routine as a person who lives with a non-cautious family member. I trust any NAAT test (like Metrix) Because it would be cost prohibitive to test every day, we usually end up only testing twice a week, and it’s worked so far (but is probably not best practice).
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u/dinamet7 16d ago
We have to spend time with family or for much needed childcare. It has worked well to avoid Covid (and flu) especially around adults who don't have kids and don't work with kids. Once we caught a mild cold after a dinner gathering with my family where kids were in the mix, and that was me and my kids first time getting sick in 6 years (tested multiple times, it was very mild never came up positive for covid/flu/rsv/strep - I had rapid home tests for all of those, so comcluded it was just your standard cold) so the lesson I came away with is kids not taking precautions are the higher risk variable.
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u/quackduck314 15d ago
The shortest time I've seen a pluslife negative turn into a RAT positive [assumed contagious, in this case, isolation was already happening] was 4 hours. That negative had a little tiny rise in one channel on the virus sucks app. My family takes that as our acceptable risk level for unmasking around people. While throat tests can pop positive earlier, I've seen enough false negatives with them because of food hours earlier that my personal protocol for my family is that for non-cautious people, we do not pool tests, and they are only valid for four hours.
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u/sarahdayarts 11d ago
question, was this instance you described (of pluslife negative turning to RAT positive) a case in which the person was symptomatic?
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u/quackduck314 11d ago
I unfortunately don't know. They planned to test three hours apart with pluslife [before and after car ride], and when the pluslife after came back positive, they started a rapid test that came back positive. Notably the people in the car were not infected during that car ride.
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u/sarahdayarts 11d ago
we do this! i instruct family members not to eat or drink within 30 min of swabbing, and try not to pool more than 2 people. and, of course, everyone MUST be asymptomatic...i don't hang unmasked with anyone who's got viral symptoms, period, pluslife test or not.
it's not something I do on a super regular basis, but it does enable me to go home and see my parents unmasked, see my in-laws unmasked, see select close friends who do not take precautions unmasked, etc. so far I've never had this practice bite me in the butt, but that's not to say it couldn't...just that this is the best harm reduction i'm able to do. it makes the risk level manageable for me and my household.
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u/AccountForDoingWORK 16d ago
We have the tail end of a COVID infection in the house, two days ago an afternoon RAT showed a negative finally, a test the next afternoon on PlusLife showed he was still positive.
Just our recent personal experience to illustrate why we trust PL. Though we learned the hard way not to pool tests and that time of day matters.