Some COVID-19 test results from state-run site at Mall at UTC delayed more than a week
It has been nine days since 74-year-old Christine Turner was tested for the coronavirus at the National Guard supported regional testing site near the Mall at the University Town Center in Sarasota. But she has been unable to get her results.
Those tested were promised results would be provided from three to five days later.
After a week passed without a call or anything in the mail, Turner called the two phone numbers provided. She left a message on one that was not returned, and the other greeted her with a loud piercing noise. She tried the on following days, again leaving messages on the one line. The other line just rang before disconnecting her.
“I have given up. I am thinking it’s like the great Florida state scam. That’s what it feels like to me,” Turner said. “Maybe the motto for this testing is: ‘There is no free lunch.’”
Turner is not alone in wanting to know whether she has COVID-19, as she remains isolated at home.
Thousands of Manatee and Sarasota residents have been tested at the National Guard-supported regional testing site near the Mall at the University Town Center. Yet many people say they are still waiting for their results more than a week after being tested.
At a news conference Friday in Jacksonville to announce the next set of re-openings in the state, Gov. Ron DeSantis said that regional testing sites have a capacity to test that exceeds the current demand.
“Every day, these sites send their samples to commercial labs for testing. These tests are performed as quickly as possible, and often are available within 72 hours of being received by the lab,” Jason Mahon, communications director for the Florida Division of Emergency Management, later told the Bradenton Herald. “Once the lab results are available, individuals are contacted as quickly as possible, with priority being placed on anyone who tested positive.”
According to Mahon, the state has “expanded the capacity to contact individuals who are tested at these sites,” in order to expedite getting people results. Details of how that capacity were expanded weren’t provided, nor was the current turnaround time for test results or how many test results are pending.
More than 7,000 people have been tested at the UTC site since it first opened on May 3.
Turner, of Palmetto and the owner of the Baobab Tree Gallery and Studios in the Village of the Arts in Bradenton, said she is becoming more and more skeptical about getting her results.
“I understand that it’s a huge undertaking,” Turner said. “And if its taking long, that’s understandable but communicate that.”
Now she is having anxiety wondering if chest tightness and all-over tingling sensation she’s been feeling could be symptoms of the disease.
“I don’t know whether it’s COVID or not, but it’s such a weird virus that we don’t know much about,” Turner said.
Allan Fenley, 74, waited four hours to be tested on May 5 and waited nine days before he got his results.
“I was eventually able to get through,” Fenley said.
He was negative for the coronavirus, but it took several attempts of calling and leaving messages when the mailbox wasn’t full, before he finally got someone on the line.
Beverly Butts, 69, of Palmetto, has been waiting since May 7 to get her results. It took her almost two hours to go through the drive-thru and get swabbed.
“I was kind of outraged. It feels like a giant scam. It looked like a publicity stunt with no science behind it,” Butts said.
Like others who did not get their results in three to five days, Butts has tried calling both phone numbers provided.
“I was on the phone, and finally got through but then it went to a busy signal,” Butts said of one of the lines.
Calling the other line, “Yesterday, midday I was able to leave a message and and I still have not had any call back.”
A retired public health nurse from upstate New York who worked for six years as a licensed infection control nurse in a hospital and then five years in public health as education officer, Butts has no confidence in how the state is handling testing or the pandemic.
“This is dreadful. We need honesty in reporting,” Butts said. “If I am an asymptotic carrier, I want to know it.”
