Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti announced Dodger Stadium will serve as the city’s largest coronavirus (COVID-19) testing location, beginning Tuesday morning. The drive-thru site will have the capacity to test 6,000 citizens per day.
“That’s three times larger than any testing site that we have,” Garcetti said. He is confident Dodger Stadium parking lot will allow those seeking tests to pass through as quickly as possible.
Large screens will provide instructions to further expedite the process. “So when drivers get to the front line, they’ll know exactly what to do and how to do it,” Garcetti highlighted.
Dodger Stadium joins 10 other locations across the city in offering testing free of charge to all L.A. county residents, regardless of whether they have symptoms of the respiratory disease. However, appointments are required and can be made at at coronavirus.lacity.org/testing or by calling 213-978-1028.
Proud to announce that on Tuesday, the city will open a new testing site at @Dodgers Stadium in partnership with @CoreResponse and @LAFD. We'll be able to test up to 6,000 Angelenos there per day.
Sign up to get tested at https://t.co/rHWABmXUEl.
— MayorOfLA (@MayorOfLA) May 23, 2020
The addition of Dodger Stadium as a testing site is a byproduct of a partnership between the City of Los Angeles, County of Los Angeles and Community Organized Relief Effort (CORE). Sean Penn founded CORE, and the organization has already worked with the city on other COVID-19 testing locations.
Testing at Dodger Stadium will be administered by LAFD and members of CORE, which will have 60 staff on hand to help. Los Angeles county currently has the capacity to conduct 21,000 tests each day.
All the city sites use mouth swab tests, which aren’t nearly as invasive as the nasal procedure, but have faced more questions in terms of accuracy. Its proponents argue that so long as mouth swab testing is completed properly, the reliability matches that of its nasal counterpart.
While there has been progress made in L.A. County, it still accounts for nearly half of all coronavirus cases and deaths in the state of California. Because of that, Dr. Deborah Birx, the White House’s coronavirus response coordinator, said the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention will examine why the region’s case numbers aren’t decreasing at a faster rate.
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