Despite having both the highest capita rate of infection and the highest positivity rate in testing in Arizona Santa Cruz County is still waiting on state funds to administer a testing blitz. Jeff Terrell, the Director of Health Services at the county, said “we have reached out to the state, we are not getting through and have tried them several times this week.”
Earlier this week Terrell confirmed that the state had promised it would help fund a testing blitz in the county.
“We are pushing and pushing,” said Terrell, “we have our contracts ready to go and want to hold the testing blitzes in Nogales, Rio Rico and Patagonia.”
Along with delays in the testing blitz the county is also experiencing a delay in receiving test results for COVID-19, sometimes up to eight days. “It used to take two to three days before [to get results] but because of a backlog in the labs it can take up to a week or eight days now. But not always.” said Terrell.
Testing delays and a high positivity rate are affecting the entire state since June. Increasing testing capacity as well as the turnaround to get results is a priority for July and August said Governor Ducey at a press conference on July 9. He announced that the federal government will be coming in to do “surge” testing due to the spread of COVID-19 in the state but only in Maryvale and South Phoenix.
Read more about what Gov. Ducey said at his July 9 press conference about testing in AZCentral “Ducey announces efforts to expand COVID-19 testing through lab capacity and new sites”