State plans to ramp up coronavirus testing

0
172

By Paul Hughes, Republican-American

HARTFORD — Gov. Ned Lamont expects diagnostic testing for coronavirus disease to increase within a week to the 6,000 tests a day he says will be required to start safely reopening businesses May 20.

Lamont reported Tuesday the number of tests being conducted in Connecticut is 11,000 shy of the 42,000 weekly tests the governor’s reopening plan contemplates.

“I will tell you in terms of testing we did about 18,000 tests a couple of weeks ago. We’re doing about 29,000 tests a week, and I think we will be surpassing the 42,000 tests a week next week,” he said.

Lamont said the planned May 20 reopening of some businesses that were completely or partially shut down is proceeding as scheduled based on the increased testing and other developments.

In addition to increased testing, the Lamont administration’s reopening strategy hinges on a 14-day decline in hospitalizations, a statewide contact tracing program, adequate hospital capacity, and sufficient supplies of personal protective equipment.

Hospitalizations continued to decline Tuesday. There was a net drop of 23 patients to 1,189. The number of hospitalizations has declined for 18 out of the last 19 days.

Like the infection rate, the death rate continued to increase. There were an additional 33 confirmed and probable deaths from COVID-19. This raised the number of fatalities to 3,041 since the first death was announced on March 18.

Locally, the Naugatuck Valley Health District reported there have been 256 laboratory-confirmed cases of coronavirus in Naugatuck and 41 in Beacon Falls as of Tuesday. There have been 12 coronavirus-associated deaths of Naugatuck residents, the health district reported. The health district hasn’t attributed any deaths of Beacon Falls residents to the coronavirus.

As of Monday, the Chesprocott Health District, which serves Cheshire, Prospect and Wolcott, reported there have been 48 cases of coronavirus in Prospect and no deaths.

State officials reported a contact-tracing program will be up and running on May 20, and the state has sufficient hospital beds to handle any flare-ups of COVID-19.

AN ADDITIONAL 5,916 TESTS were reported since Monday, bringing the overall number of tests to 138,424 through Tuesday.

The daily counts include patients who were tested multiple times, or multiple specimens tested from the same person, per guidelines from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Public health officials reported an additional 568 positive tests for COVID-19. There have been 34,333 laboratory-confirmed cases since the first positive result involving someone from Connecticut was announced on March 8.

Lamont said the number of reported positive tests fell below 10% for the third consecutive day.

“That is a step in the right direction in terms of what we want to see,” he said.

Turnaround times for tests results are also expected to pick up as testing increases.

The state received more than 20 responses to a request for proposals for testing services that asked bidders to describe how they would report results within 48 hours of identification, said Josh Geballe, the state commissioner of administrative services, and the chief operating officer for the Lamont administration.

He said the first two agreements were negotiated with Yale New Haven Health and The Jackson Laboratory in Connecticut. He said state-based laboratories will be able to deliver the results at a more rapid pace, ideally within 24 hours.

State officials could not say how many of the 5,916 additional tests announced on Tuesday, or the 568 additional positive cases were reported within 24 hours of specimens being taken.

The Jackson Laboratory is expecting to increase its current processing of roughly 550 tests a day to 20,000 tests a day by July, said Auro Nair, an executive vice president for the company. He estimated a turnaround time of 24 hours.

CEO Marna Borgstrom said Yale New Haven Health expects to ramp up to 5,000 COVID-19 diagnostic tests a day by the end of May. She said the state’s largest hospital system is looking to double that to 10,000 a day in June, and 20,000 a day later this summer.

Lamont estimated Connecticut will process 100,000 COVID-19 diagnostic tests a week in June.

THE LARGEST DELIVERY YET of personal protective equipment has created a 60-day supply of masks, gowns, gloves and other needed items to help frontline workers in the fight against COVID-19.

Lamont and Lt. Gov. Susan Bysiewicz toured a Connecticut National Guard warehouse on Tuesday morning where the PPE is being stored for future distribution.

The shipment from China included 6 million surgical masks, 500,000 protective masks, 100,000 surgical gowns and 100,000 contact-less thermometers. It arrived Saturday.

“We’ve delivered more surgical masks in the last two days than we’ve given away in the last two months,” Lamont said.

He said the supplies are being sorted to be sent out to first responders, hospital staff, nursing homes workers and others. Geballe said 6.7 million pieces of PPE cost more than $10 million.

Elio Gugliotti contributed to this report.