DON’T go to ER for tests, state says —
With the highly contagious omicron variant of the Covid-19 coronavirus on the loose in Fayette County, many people are looking for test sites.
Read on to find out where to go for free tests and where NOT to go, according to the Georgia Department of Public Health and your local hospital.
First, where NOT to go: Hospital emergency rooms, no matter where you are, says DPH. Just don’t go there for testing or for information about tests. ERs are stretched thin and just can’t spare the time or personnel for walk-ins without serious medical emergencies.
In Fayette County, here’s where you should go — with an appointment — to get free Covid testing: 175 Johnson Ave., Fayetteville, Ga. 30214.
Here are 2 map views of that Fayetteville location:
Here’s that urgent suggestion from the DPH:
DPH Urges Georgians NOT to Go to Hospital Emergency Departments for Covid Testing
Atlanta — To help keep hospital emergency departments open to treat medical emergencies, individuals seeking Covid testing should not go to hospital emergency departments, unless they are experiencing severe Covid-19 symptoms requiring urgent medical attention. Asymptomatic individuals or individuals with mild symptoms should find testing sites other than hospital emergency departments.
Covid-19 testing locations are available throughout Georgia and can be found on the Georgia Department of Public Health (DPH) website at https://dph.georgia.gov/Covidtesting. We are working with our lab partners to expand testing hours and add testing sites, however, lines will continue to be long as thousands of Georgians want to get tested.
To help alleviate delays at testing sites, it is critical that people register BEFORE going to a DPH test site. Online registration (https://dph.georgia.gov/Covidtesting) will help alleviate back-ups at test sites and free up staff to do more testing if they aren’t doing registration paperwork.
Covid vaccination is available statewide and is our best tool for ending this pandemic and reducing the overwhelming strain on the healthcare system and healthcare providers. To find a Covid vaccination location, visit https://dph.georgia.gov/Covid-vaccine.
Georgians aged 5 and older are eligible for vaccination. Georgians 16 and older are eligible for boosters six months after completing their primary vaccine series of either Moderna or Pfizer (only Pfizer is authorized for booster doses in 16- and 17- year-olds) and two months after their J&J vaccine.
Basic prevention measures should also be followed to help prevent further spread of Covid and mitigate outbreaks of infection, especially in public settings: wear a mask, physically distance, and wash your hands frequently with soap and water.
For updates on Covid-19, follow @GaDPH and @GovKemp on Twitter and @GaDPH and @GovKemp on Facebook.
He needed to have a test within 3 days of going back, we go him tested (negative results on Friday, and then had a chance for a college visit on Monday afternoon & thus needed to take him back on Tue (outside of the 72hr window). To be safe (in case the school was going to insist on it being within the 72hr window), we got him tested on Monday. He has no symptoms as of today.
He needed to have a test within 3 days of going back, we go him tested (negative results on Friday, and then had a chance for a college visit on Monday afternoon & thus needed to take him back on Tue (outside of the 72hr window). To be safe (in case the school was going to insist on it being within the 72hr window), we got him tested on Monday. He has no symptoms as of today. The free tests are not accureate.
Update – Finally received my son’s results from Mako which are in error as it says positive. Even though he has no symptoms and had tested negative 3 days earlier.
What a joke as this free testing is just to get additional false positives to keep everyone scared.
Nailed it.
You mention update. Where is the original?
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This testing is a joke – waited for almost 3 hours on Monday for my Son to get a neg test so he could go back to school. The Mako Medical webpage will not provide results 48hours later and the auto call back phone call never comes. This looks to be a waste of money and probably just more padding of the covid/flu #s to keep the fear porn going.
Also they are still using the PCR test that the CDC withdrew eff. 12.31.2021 because it cannot differentiate between Covid and the Flu
Or he’s now truly positive since within the early stages of infection, it’s quite possible the virus was not detected at that time (3 days prior). Using common sense here, if you feel this is a false positive result, then an immediate retest will produce a final determination on the matter.
What was the reason the son was tested? If he had no symptoms, was he going somewhere that needed a negative test or proof of vaccination?
It appears to be for school. But an obvious question here is, if you test negative why the need to test again 3 days later, specifically with a non-symptomatic patient? Doesn’t add up just like his claim that the PCR test used cannot differentiate between the flu and SARS-CoV-2. Of course it can since the test has a high level of sensitivity and specificity to the virus, even within a multiplexed method platform.