Inside San Francisco ’s Ambitious Plan to Bring Universal Coronavirus Testing to An Entire U.S. City

Public health experts can’t say it enough: If the U.S. is going to beat COVID-19, the country needs to ramp up testing. But there’s no single blueprint for cities and states to follow as they respond to that call. Some, like Los Angeles, are going big. In late April, L.A. became the first major city to offer free testing to any resident. Others, like San Francisco, are doing things in a more progressive style, with goals that are just as ambitious. The latter is strategizing from a place of strength. Thanks to some of the nation’s earliest stay-at-home orders, San Francisco has, so far, flattened the curve with relative success. Businesses around the city have been allowed to reopen for curbside pickup. And key to continuing on the path back to normality is continually testing residents, city officials say, with a focus on “vulnerability” above all else. Over the past 11 weeks, since San Francisco began analyzing tests at city labs rather than shipping them off to Atlanta, officials have been gradually widening the circle of who is eligible to get one. The decision not to let just anyone sign up was partly about limited resources. It took time for the city to stabilize its supply chain. But public health officials also wanted to prioritize those who were most at risk. At first, data about risk factors were limited, with officials focused on simple criteria like whether someone had traveled to China. Since then, the calculation has gotten more co...
Source: TIME: Health - Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Tags: Uncategorized COVID-19 Source Type: news