COVID tests hard to find
As demand increases, Danbury looks to expand hours, potentially add location
DANBURY — Holiday travel, rising COVID-19 cases and concerns about the omicron variant have made it harder to get a COVID test.
Community providers in Danbury say demand has increased for COVID tests. Unlike in previous surges, there are fewer drive-thru testing sites available, and the provider that has offered COVID testing in Danbury in recent months plans to end its work in the state in January. That provider, SEMA4, is expected to be replaced, officials said.
“They (the state) have assured us that there won’t be any break in services once SEMA4 is done with their contract, that they have another vendor who will step in, and there won’t be any break in continuity in testing services,” said Kara Prunty, the city’s health director.
The health department is working with the state to expand hours at the testing sites that SEMA4 runs in Danbury, she said. Those new hours could start next week. The city has asked the state to open another testing site in Danbury, too.
“Demand has been very high this week for testing, especially with the Christmas holidays coming up, which is very encouraging that people are doing the responsible thing before they have their family gathering and their traveling,” Prunty said.
Rising COVID cases and the highly contagious omicron variant are other factors, she said.
“The state is trying very, very hard in Connecticut, and it’s equally true in New York, to make testing available, but the demand has really soared beyond our present capacity,” said Dr. John Murphy, president and CEO of Nuvance Health.
Ideally, families should use testing, in addition to vaccinations and boosters, to gather safely for the holidays, but it’s going to be “tough” to get tested this week, he said.
“The higher need are the people who are symptomatic,” Murphy said. “There the ones who, if they have COVID, they should be given priority to the testing because those are the people you really do want to have isolated, particularly if there's an underlying health condition.”
AFC Urgent Care has seen demand rise for COVID tests in recent weeks.
“As soon as the news started breaking as far as omicron, I think many folks started panicking,” said Kaushik Makati, spokesman with AFC Urgent Care, which has three locations in Danbury.
He added the increase in COVID exposures has also caused testing demand to be “quite strong.” For about 1 1/2 months, AFC has started handing out tickets to patients lined up at the center for a COVID test.
“Those tickets are pretty much exhausted within the first hour,” he said.
In fact, demand is about the same as it was this time last year, when the state and country faced a surge, Makati said.
“We may even have seen a slight increase from last year,” he said.
Thanks to the vaccine, however, the situation isn’t as dire, he said. Vaccinated individuals generally experience less-serious symptoms than those without the vaccine, helping people to feel more “confident,” he said.
“We’re in a little better place than we were last year as more folks are getting vaccinated,” Makati said.
Where can you get tested?
Drive-thru COVID-19 testing is available from SEMA4 at the Pat Waldron Building on Memorial Drive and the Police Activities League Building at Hayestown Road. The company announced last week that it plans to end its contract with the state in January.
For now, free testing is available from 3 to 7 p.m. Mondays and Wednesdays, as well as 10 a.m. to 2 pm Saturdays, as the Pat Waldon Building. The PAL Building offers testing from 3 to 7 p.m. Thursdays and 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Tuesdays and Fridays.
Nuvance Health, the Community Health Center and the Connecticut Institute for Communities offer COVID testing for their patients.
“Demand for testing at Nuvance Health Medical Practices has increased substantively,” Dr. Cornelius Ferreira, Nuvance Health medical practices primary care, said in a statement. “We are reserving testing supplies for sick care and referring those looking for travel-related testing to community resources.”
The Connecticut Institute for Communities in Danbury and the Community Health Center, which has locations across the state, including on Delay Street in Danbury, offered drive-thru testing for the community until June 30, when their contracts with the state expired.
Both federally qualified health centers said they’d restart community testing if needed.
“CHC is willing to stand up community-based testing if the state requests it of us,” said Amy Taylor, vice president of the western region.
Demand for tests among patients has been “significant,” she said.
State officials told the Connecticut Institute for Communities that they’ve already contracted with a different provider to fill the hole that Sema4 will leave, said Katie Curran, president and CEO of CIFC.
“We’re going to keep watching the need here and just see how it increases,” she said. “We always want to be able to step in to help where needed, assuming we have the workforce to be able to support that.”
Staff are needed for primary care health services, as well as COVID vaccines. On some days, more than 200 people have walked into the 132 Main St. clinic for boosters or pediatric vaccines, Curran said.
Through a new federal initiative, CIFC on Tuesday planned to order at-home COVID testing kits that can be distributed to its patients and the community for free.
Curran said she plans to order “as many as we can.”
“Obviously increased access to at-home testing is really important to stop the spread of COVID-19 and keep people home who are sick,” she said.
The nonprofit is developing a plan for how to distribute the kits, but plans to prioritize its patients first. CIFC serves more than 15,000 low- and- moderate-income patients.
At AFC, the number of tickets available for COVID testing varies, but could range from 75 to more than 100, Makati said.
“It depends on each center and the staffing that we have within that center on that particular day,” he said. “The more staffed we are, the more we can accommodate.”
AFC offers its urgent care services, on top of COVID testing, he said. Existing staff are working to meet the demand for both, while the company is recruiting additional employees.
“It’s stressing (for) our staff, as well,” Makati said. “Anyone in health care can tell you that they’re tired.”