Everybody Can Get Tested for COVID-19 in LA and now, There is Surplus in Unused Kits in the City
Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti recently announced they made COVID-19 testing available to any individual who wants to be tested. And now, as a new report said, the city finds itself with overly excessive unused testing kits amid the countrywide shortage.
The information which the mayor's office provided to The Associated Press indicated that LA currently has thousands of tests that have gone unused each week, while the whole country stays unable to get adequate testing kits out.
The report said the city is paying "$137 for each test, and 75,000 kits are available each week." However, in the two weeks that Mayor Garcetti expanded the tests, only roughly "57,000 tests have been used" on average per week.
LA Seen a Constant Increase in COVID-19 Cases
LA, considered as America's surrounding county and the second-largest city, has reportedly seen a constant rise in COVID-19 cases, from which, there is "an average of 885 new cases" per day is said to be being recorded for the past week.
However, the officials said, residents, can go through the test as often as they want. Relatively, a website which the city set up allows all residents to get connected to book for testing at a location they prefer. They can also get tested whether or not, they are showing some symptoms of the virus.
And, while LA reportedly has a surplus of unused test kits, Harvard Global Health Institute director, Dr. Ashish Jha keeps on saying that the US is experiencing a shortage in testing kits.
"It was inadequate," said the director on Wednesday, explaining the scenario to the Select Subcommittee on COVID-19 that, "It was inadequate testing that triggered the nationwide shutdown."
Meanwhile, the mayor's plan to allow all residents of LA to get tested was, reports said, an attempt to ensure that the kits were not going to waste.
Los Angeles collaborated with a startup company, Curative-Kora that developed a more rapid and simpler way to test for COVID-19 without the need to depend on supplies that were either in high demand or scarce.
This new test was able to obtain an emergency approval from the Food and Drug Administration. More so, Los Angeles has been using the tests since late March.
Partnership with a Private Firm
During the latter part of March, reports came out that Los Angeles had "turned to private partners" which included a lab that's said to be using robots to intensely scale-up COVID-19 tests.
Along with the report was the county's announcement of a collaboration with Curative Inc. of San Dimas. This private firm developed a test for COVID-19 and has worked with a San Dimas lab known as Korvalabs to have the specimens processed.
Essentially, KorvaLabs was expected to have the ability to process around 5,000 test each day by the end of the week the partnership was announced, and it hoped to increase the number to 10,000 each day the following week.
According to UCLA epidemiologist Jeffrey Klausner, expectations in figures should be met since the lab would be using robots.
However, the epidemiologist added, it takes humans for everything to be up and running and therefore, at that time, he said, "all hands on deck."
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