Doctors are perfectly capable of diagnosing nCoV without test kits:
Case definition of the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC)
A suspected or probable case is defined as a case that meets: (1) three clinical criteria or (2) two clinical criteria and one epidemiological criterion. Clinical criteria are: fever; radiographic evidence of pneumonia or acute respiratory distress syndrome; and low or normal white blood cell count or low lymphocyte count. Epidemiological criteria are: living in Wuhan or travel history to Wuhan within 14 days before symptom onset; contact with patients with fever and symptoms of respiratory infection within 14 days before symptom onset; and a link to any confirmed cases or clusters of suspected cases.
The definition of a confirmed case, for the first case in a province, is a suspected or probable case with detection of viral nucleic acid at the city CDC and provincial CDC. For the second case and all subsequent cases, the definition is a suspected or probable case with detection of virus nucleic acid at the city CDC.
Source:
The Lancet
I cannot speak to the general concern about
"running out of test kits". It may be true, or it may not. I don't think it's true of countries outside of China, yet they are also showing a significant decline in the rate of increase in new cases; even better than mainland China. If outside China is declining, why wouldn't cases inside China also decline, albeit at a lesser rate due to the sheer numbers involved?
You can expect the worst if you want to. Look at the this posting from just a few days ago:
Post 10676945 which says
"(this) model has predicted the outcome very accurately so far". The model predicted 52,500 case by 3 Feb whereas the actual number is c. 20,000, hardly
"very accurate". This illustrates the problem with extrapolation and
assuming that no action shall be taken to reduce spread. That's not what happens in real life.
We have extensive experience in dealing with outbreaks before. They typically follow a pattern of initial exponential growth, followed by reduced increases as quarantine and immunisation efforts take hold. No case is smooth; there are bureaucratic delays, shortages of equipment, and foot-dragging by politicians all the time. Look at the Ebola crisis from a few years ago. It happened before and is happening now.
What is different this time around is the aggressive isolation policy by the Chinese government. We've not seen entire cities and provinces shutdown since the Middle Ages. This makes a huge difference. That, coupled with the data showing the same sort of decline as in other outbreaks, gives me confidence that while the road is not entirely smooth it is at least heading in the right direction.