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My fun COVID testing experience.
Yesterday morning, I woke up – with everyone else in SA - discovering the new COVID cases.
Yesterday morning, I woke up – with everyone else in SA - discovering the new COVID cases.
At that stage I wasn’t particularly worried about my own health, I did have a bit of a cough, but hadn’t been to any of the hotspots, so decided to just see how everything played out.
Within a couple of hours though, SA Health added a hotspot that was a few hundred meters from my house, that I’d visited the day before. I also started getting a scratchy throat, so I decided that it was probably best to get tested.
I went to the SA Health Covid site and checked out the testing centres. There were a few around – even one a few hundred meters from my house – but nearly all of them noted “Appointment and referral required” (They still do today!)
So, my GF and I headed out to the drive through testing site on Hampstead Road and discovered that there was a 2 KM queue that extended to Grand Junction Road. Decided to see if we could get an appointment & referral to one of the smaller testing centres.
Got back home, started looking through appointment only centres that didn’t require referrals. The three centres I tried only had a mobile number for contact, and all three immediately went to already full voicemail.
So then I started trying to get in to a GP to get a referral, hoping I could just do a telehealth. Checked my normal GP’s online bookings and they were booked for the day, so started calling around. No one could get me in and just referred me to Hampstead.
I then called my GP’s office to look into getting an appointment the next day and at this point was told I could just do a booking at a Clinpath clinic, as the referrals were being waived. Completed a Clinpath booking which still said ‘You must have a GP referral before attending
The centre around my corner had no bookings available, so booked in at Port Adelaide for 13:10 (It was then 12:30). Drove over to Port Adelaide and queued up. Line was only 170m long so expected an hour or two, and settled in.
Instead of an hour or two, it took a bit more than four. Talking to the workers when we were swabbed, it was only two people, who had been there all day, with no relief and had no idea when they would finish for the day.
Also was then told that I didn't need a booking, they were just testing everyone who came through.
So, I’m a bit worried about the response from a few perspectives. I mean, I’m no disease expert person, butttt
Shouldn’t this level of instant demand be expected?
Shouldn’t there be some sort of rapid ramp up capacity?
Shouldn’t this level of instant demand be expected?
Shouldn’t there be some sort of rapid ramp up capacity?
I really hope those workers were getting overtime at a MINIMUM
There really needs to be better communication of wait times and what to expect
What if I didn’t have a job that I could disappear from for five hours? I had to join a Zoom meeting in my car.
There really needs to be better communication of wait times and what to expect
What if I didn’t have a job that I could disappear from for five hours? I had to join a Zoom meeting in my car.
All the clinics near me are drive through. What happens if I didn’t have a car? Clinpath seems to only offer home visits for elderly, and SA Pathology says they do 60 visits per day, plus you need a referral that must be faxed (!) to them
Imagine having to wait five hours if you have kids?!?!
Seems like there should be more workers?
Seems like there should be more workers?
Once I was tested, I realised ‘Oh wait, I haven’t had food today and uhhh, I don’t really have anything at home right now, how do I eat without potentially exposing people because Uber drivers can never find my house?’
What if I can't afford uber eats??
What if I can't afford uber eats??
It was good that they were testing everyone who came in without a booking, but again, needed to be communicated better because I wasted a lot of time trying to figure out what options were available.
It really seems that after having most of a year to prepare for this exact scenario things should maybe be a bit more organised? I personally am okay with waiting 4+ hours because I can make it work given I don't have anything really happening in my life, and...
a job from which I can disappear, but most people - Especially low income people most likely to be exposed to covid - aren't me.
It's all a bit worrying tbh.
It's all a bit worrying tbh.
oh also, what if instead of this convoluted mess you just said 'COVID tests are free' and just covered the edge cases
