LANCASTER, Pa. — The Pennsylvania Department of Health on Friday announced the planned opening of 12 regional drive-thru and walk-in COVID-19 testing clinics, including one at Park City Mall in Lancaster.
The Park City clinic is located at the former Sears Auto Center at 142 Park City Center.
The other clinics will be held at locations in Bradford, Clarion, Fulton, and Pike counties, according to Secretary of Health Dr. Rachel Levine.
The 12 clinics will open on Tuesday, Jan. 12, according to the department.
The counties with testing sites will continue to change weekly over the next seven weeks so that 61 counties will eventually be covered by dedicated pop-up testing sites over a 12-week period, Levine said.
“Over the past several weeks, we have seen a rapid increase of positive case counts reaching record-high levels, which gives us significant cause for concern,” Levine said. “In fact, every county now has a positivity-rate greater than five percent, which is alarming. In addition, 21 counties have percent positivity above 20 percent.”
The department believes that increased testing in the counties will assist in determining the prevalence of the virus and assist the county in moving forward. Concerning counties, identified as those with percent positives above five percent, which is currently every county in the state, can be found on the Early Warning Monitoring Dashboard. Each county is being monitored as the state continues to examine all available data.
“We are grateful for our tremendous partnership with AMI and participating county entities to provide pop-up testing in five regions across the commonwealth,” Levine said. “The AMI testing sites will be open to anyone who feels they need a test. It is important that even people with no symptoms who test positive isolate to stop the spread of COVID-19.”
Testing will be available daily from 9:00 AM to 6:00 PM starting Tuesday, January 12 through Saturday, January 16.
Up to 450 patients can be tested per day. Mid-nasal passage swab PCR tests will be performed. Testing is on a first-come, first-serve basis and is completely free to all patients. Testing is also open to individuals who are not county residents. Patients must be ages three and older and are not required to show symptoms of COVID-19 in order to be tested. No appointment is necessary. Patients are encouraged to bring a photo-ID or insurance card. Registration will also be completed on-site. The turnaround time for testing results is two to seven days after testing.
People who are tested should self-quarantine while they await test results. Those who live with other people should self-quarantine in a private room and use a private bathroom if possible.
Others living in the home with the individual awaiting test results should also stay at home.
The department has additional instructions for individuals waiting for a COVID-19 test result. Individuals who test positive will receive a phone call from AMI while individuals who test negative will receive a secured-PDF emailed to them from AMI.
