Germany Makes Rapid Virus Tests a Key to Everyday Freedoms

At the start of the coronavirus pandemic, public health officials in Flint, Michigan began tracking the demographics of those who were testing positive for the virus in order to better align the county's public health action and outreach. In doing so, officials realized that a lack of access to testing in predominately Black neighborhoods was a contributing factor and decided to launch mobile testing, barrier-free sites, and other interventions at the state level.

Birmingham, Alabama’s Church of the Highlands has opened up a drive-through COVID19 testing station that has already seen over 1,000 people. By coordinating with Alabama’s governor, the church is able to help test people who are showing symptoms and then give them directives on what to do next, whether it be to go to the hospital or go home and rest. Those with health insurance get their insurance billed, but for those without, they don’t have to pay at all.

In early January, doctors at UW Medical Center began preparing for a coronavirus outbreak by transforming a research lab into a screening center for coronavirus that delivers results within a day. Now, coupled with a mobile clinic that allows for people to be tested from within the confines of their cars, the city has been able to test a large volume of people more safely than if they were being tested from within a hospital.

Taiwan responded to COVID-19 quickly, which helped keep cases low and avoid widespread shutdowns. The country had closely tracked its PPE stockpiles since the 2003 SARS outbreak, has a national health command center to coordinate responses, and uses a well-defined set of procedures to track and manage people under infectious risk or quarantine. Masks are required and provided to every citizen, inbound travelers were quickly regulated, and contact tracing and testing is widely used to prevent outbreaks. Citizens generally listen to authorities, though fines and other sanctions also encourage compliance.

Wichita secured $850,376 of federal grant money through the CARES Act, which it is distributing to homeless shelters and other organizations that work with people experiencing homelessness to slow the spread of COVID-19. Local providers connect with each other to share their best practices for stopping the virus, including taking temperatures, mandatory hand-washing, and mask wearing, and making sure that beds meet social distancing guidelines. None of their clients in homeless shelters have tested positive so far.

Volunteers with India’s Meds For More initiative (MFM) collect leftover unused medications from recovered Covid-19 patients by canvassing their apartment buildings, offices, student clubs, schools, and other locations. Once collected, MFM distributes them to NGOs licensed to work in the health sector, who transport the medicines to marginalized communities in urban and rural areas. Medical professionals sort and pack the medicines and give them to local hospitals and health care centers, who distribute them to patients. The success of the program has inspired similar initiatives in several other cities.

Jesuit High School in Northern California has remained open in full for two months without encountering a single outbreak of Covid-19 amongst school attendants. While it hasn't been inexpensive, the parochial school routinely conducts districtwide on-site rapid coronavirus tests and attributes this protocol to the overall success.

In Massachussetts, a two-month long state-run pilot program is allowing some schools to resume in-person classes. Each week, more than 300,000 students are tested through the program. Instead of individual tests, the program uses “pool-testing,” “which batches samples from multiple people into a single tube.” The method is cheaper. The weekly tests allows schools to stay ahead of outbreaks. For now, the state is paying for the program, which costs up to $60 million. After the two months, the districts will have to pay for the program themselves.

Using data to determine which neighborhoods would likely be disproportionately at risk for COVID-19, the East Boston Neighborhood Health Center has been moving their pop-up testing site to a new area every two weeks and has been able to conduct nearly 5,000 tests per week across the city as a result. Once the vaccine becomes available in the city, officials plan to replicate this testing model.

High school students at Somerset High School in San Antonio, Texas get tested every week for COVID-19. The method is called “assurance testing,” and is a way to target “silent spreaders,” people who have COVID who don’t show symptoms and spread the virus to the larger community. With assurance testing, silent spreaders are quickly identified, preventing them from spreading COVID. “Of the 70,000 tests Community Labs has run so far, 1,700 were identified as positive for COVID-19. Most of those positive test results came from people who were asymptomatic and had no idea they had the virus.”