Drive-through virus testing

April 22, 2020

 

 

ROK’s New Drive-Thru testing facility for COVID-19

The Government has also developed an innovative way to test the COVID-19: approximately 49 drive-through testing stations (as of 25 August 2020). For instance, Gyeonggi Province set up a drive-thru testing facility on February 26, where symptom checks, sample collection and payment receipt are done in a one-stop fashion in under 10 minutes. At the drive-through coronavirus testing site, citizens simply let their windows down, and allow the nurses (protected by safety gears) to register the visitors, check their body temperatures, and use the swabs to get samples from their throats and noses. Results of the test come out within three days (including weekends) and are sent to testers by SMS.

Likewise, Seoul Metropolitan Government is now operating the 'Drive Through' clinic in one location (as of 24 August 2020). If additional tests such as lung X-rays are needed during the process, tests will be conducted in conjunction with nearby municipal hospitals and public health centers.

Sejong City, where the Government Complex is located, was an early adopter of the drive-through testing site until it finished its operation with the decrease of confirmed cases. "If you take samples and wait for the results at home, you don't have to quarantine them at the hospital and not many people have to wait," said Moran Ki, Head of the Korean Society for Preventive Medicine's COVID-19 Response Committee.