New system to yield faster test results – MOH

A new Ministry of Health system is expected to make headway in clearing the large backlog of COVID-19 test results, starting from Tuesday, Senior Medical Officer of Health Dr Anton Best has declared.

In a COVID-19 update from Ilaro Court on Monday, Dr Best said a new four-tier system announced on Friday had begun in earnest on Monday, with results expecting to benefit from the new process as early as Tuesday.

Dr Best said: “We expect to see improvements right away. We have started the categorization process, where we have identified sites for the Category 1; Category 1 is the priority samples that we will be receiving, and those samples will be prioritized, and those samples will be out within 24 hours [after] being received by the lab.

“So all of these things are coming together to improve the situation that we found ourselves in, and certainly, by tomorrow [Tuesday] we will start to make headway. Will everything be resolved right away, no, but we are getting there.”

The Best-Dos-Santos Public Health Laboratory also has a new inventory system for samples, with plans also underway to increase the capacity of human resources, working at the lab, the health official added.

“The lab remains inundated with testing samples.” Dr Best said. “We are implementing a new testing system, and this is something that we are doing in collaboration with Ministry of Tourism partners, and this is just one key point I have to make. The Ministry of Health and Wellness does not have all of the solutions, and this is why partnerships are of critical importance.

“We have also looked at the additional capacity that the lab needs and this is something that we would have been working on for the last few months – because of the surge and demand in services, we are adding more human resource capacities.”

There are currently around 400 visitors in quarantine awaiting test results.

Under the four-tier system, Category 1 would include medical officers, primary contacts of positive cases, police officers, inmates at HMP Dodds, prison officers, soldiers, all medical personnel border security, immigration officers, customs officers, port workers, patients awaiting tests for medical treatment and patients in elder care facilities.

Those in Category 2 would include inbound and outbound visitors and they could also expect results within 24 hours.

Secondary and tertiary contacts would comprise Category 3 and they could expect results within 24 to 36 hours, while people who wanted to be tested out of general curiosity would be placed in Category 4 and could expect results between 48 to 72 hours.

(SB)