Nearly 5,000 noses swabbed during region’s drive-thru COVID-19 testing

The Windsor-essex County Health Unit has surpassed its goal of testing 3,700 people for COVID-19 at drive-thru assessment stations throughout the region.

A total of 4,916 individuals seated in their vehicles received the uncomfortable swab up the nose between May 29 and June 12.

In partnership with Essex-windsor EMS and the Windsor-essex Community Health Centre, the health unit held full-day drivethru testing at locations in each of the region’s eight municipalities.

“Random testing was conducted to provide a sense of the prevalence of COVID-19 within Windsor-essex,” said a news release from the health unit on Monday. “Random testing for COVID -19 is important as it provides better quality data for analysis, planning and intervention through random sampling of the community.”

Random drive-thru testing also allowed for increased accessibility by bringing assessment to each community, the health unit said.

To date, the tests of eight individuals who participated in the drive-thru swabbings have come back positive. The health unit is still waiting for the results of some tests, which were most recently administered on Friday in Lakeshore.

Further data collected during the 10 days of drive-thru testing will be shared by the health unit Friday.

As of Tuesday morning, 1,224 people in Windsor and Essex County have tested positive for COVID-19, an increase of 26 from Monday.

In total, 713 people have recovered, 420 are self-isolating, one is in hospital, and 67 have died. The status of the remaining 20 individuals is still under investigation by the health unit.

Two local long-term care homes are being monitored for COVID -19 outbreaks. They are Village of Aspen Lake in Tecumseh and Country Village Homes in Woodslee. One staff member at each of the two facilities has tested positive for the virus within the past two weeks.