Los Angeles County has introduced a take-home program for COVID-19 test kits as a way to expand testing during the rapid surge in infections.
On Monday, the county Department of Health Services said the program is designed for residents unable to get appointments as the demand for tests increases during a dramatic upswing in infections due to the Omicron variant.
"We look forward to reducing the waiting time to get tested for individuals unable to book an appointment,'' said Paula Siler, director of Community Mobile Testing Operations at DHS."Once all 13 pick-up testing locations are fully operating and once our home testing kit-by-mail program is simultaneously re-launched later this week, we will have successfully added over 10,000 additional daily COVID tests available to the residents of L.A. County.
"It is unacceptable how long our residents have had to wait or how far they have had to drive just to get tested for COVID-19 these past few weeks,'' Hahn said."L.A. County needs to treat this demand for testing with urgency. I am urging the county to deploy our disaster service workers and calling on our Department of Health Services to set up testing sites at L.A. County Libraries and health clinics.
The letter went on to suggest that free over-the-counter tests should be made available nationwide throughout the duration of the pandemic. It noted that some public health officials are calling for twice that number, or roughly 2.3 billion tests per month.
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