NYC urges limits on virus tests, citing equipment shortage
People who believe they have COVID-19 and who meet the criteria wait in line to be pre-screened for the corona virus outside of the Brooklyn Hospital Center on March 20, 2020 in the Brooklyn borough of New York. (Photo by Angela Weiss / AFP) (Photo b
New York City health officials have directed medical providers to stop giving patients tests for the coronavirus, except for people sick enough to require hospitalization, saying wider testing is exhausting supplies of protective equipment.
In an advisory issued Friday, the health department said outpatient testing should stop unless results would impact treatment for the patient.
“Persons with COVID-like illness not requiring hospitalization should be instructed to stay home. It is safer for the patients and health care workers,” the advisory said.
It said demand for unnecessary testing is contributing to a national shortage of masks, gowns, collection swabs and other supplies, all of which need to be discarded by health care workers after each test.
It also directed health care providers not test asymptomatic people, including health care workers or first responders.
The order came amid a huge surge in testing in New York. After a slow start, testing sites have proliferated, and many officials have said that widespread testing is a key to fighting the spread of the disease.
As of Friday morning, more than 32,000 people had been tested in the state, almost a third of them in the last day, Gov. Andrew Cuomo said.
More than 7,000 New Yorkers have tested positive. More than 1,200 have been hospitalized.
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Similar restrictions on testing have been implemented in other parts of the state.
Albany Medical Center and St. Peter's Health Partners said they were also suspending community testing to conserve resources.
“The difficult decision was made in order to conserve testing resources for those at highest risk, including inpatients, symptomatic direct care workers and those with high-risk exposure to the virus,” according to a release.