Indiana Expanding Number of COVID-19 Testing Sites
This COVID testing machine
Subscriber Benefit
As a subscriber you can listen to articles at work, in the car, or while you work out. Subscribe NowThe state is opening 95 new COVID-19 testing sites thanks, in part, to $30 million in federal funding. Indiana currently has 233 testing sites across the state.
Indiana State Department of Health Commissioner Dr. Kristina Box said the new test sites are being led by local health departments as a result of grants that we were able to provide through the federal CARES Act.
“One of our top priorities throughout this pandemic has been to expand access to testing and reduce the time people spend waiting for their results,” said Box in a news release.
Box said the ISDH developed this program as a way to get creative and increasing testing options for Hoosiers across the state.
“These funds will support supplies technology equipment, PPE and other costs,” said Box. “More than a dozen sites open last week and 22 others are scheduled to open by the end of the week.”
She said the remainder are set to be up and running by the beginning of the month. Box said she expects the local health department sites to be able to conduct between 100 and 200 tests per day.
Fort Wayne-based Parkview Health System has joined the growing list of hospitals and health systems across the state taking part in the ISDH lab testing network.
The health system said it received a new testing machine from Indianapolis-based Roche Diagnostics Corp. The lab equipment at Parkview Regional Medical Center will allow it to reduce the turnaround time for COVID-19 diagnostic tests in the region.
“Due to national demand, we would not have been able to obtain this equipment without the state’s support. We are happy to join their lab network to enable more efficient testing in our region and elsewhere as needed,” said Jeff Boord, M.D., chief quality and safety officer, Parkview Health.
Parkview said the Roche machine will run about 400 tests per day, but it is capable of processing up to 1,000 tests per day.
Dr. Box explained how federal funding is allowing the state to boost its testing efforts.