Here in Australia, I just experienced something the other day that I hope is not typical across the rest of the country.
I developed two of the symptoms that indicated I should get tested - a sore throat and a slight fever, so I dutifully decided to do the right thing and head for a testing station in my car. The first and closest one I drove to I learned had just closed for the day, despite no sign at the entrance. It was just after 5.00pm. I was directed to another testing station about 5 km away that was supposedly open until 7.30 pm so I drove there, saw cars in line and drove in to join the queue. A chap came up to my window to advise me that this location was currently 'suspended' - yet even he didn't know what that meant when I asked him, just said that's what he was told to say. I was then directed to yet another testing station another 3 or so km down the road. This one was open so after checking in with my mobile phone and getting my unique number, I was able to join the queue of cars only to find that of the two lanes that had been set up for testing, only one was open and being used with around six to eight gowned people sitting at a table seemingly doing nothing but chatting to each other. Two gowned individuals were servicing two cars at a time, with the rest kept waiting for a good distance before the testing area. About 30 minutes later, it was finally my turn. The test was quick - taking no longer than about 5 minutes, yet I was told to sit there, engine off and wait for an SMS thanking me for getting tested which took about another 5 minutes. Now the wait times were starting to make sense. As I was leaving the area after getting my 'thank you' SMS, I noted there were around another ~40+ cars in line. I would have been interested to hear how many (if any?) got turned around or sent away when it hit 7.30 pm. I have the entire experience saved on my Dash Cam.
The point of the above story is that though I was determined to do what it takes to get myself tested, how many people would have just given up after being turned away not once, but twice and then seeing a long line of cars at a third location?
My thoughts. To close a covid testing station at 5.00 pm is crazy. 7.30 pm I can understand, but to me 8.30 would make more sense as our current lockdown curfew isn't until 9.00 pm. I still have no idea what 'suspended' means at the second testing station, nor why there appeared to be so many testing staff at the third location, only to see the vast majority of them sitting down at a large outside table apparently doing nothing while a perfectly good testing lane was closed and not being utilised.
Maybe I'm a cynic, but it seems to me that our testing procedures are about as good as our vaccination rollout was. I'm 60 years old and suffer from emphysema and COPD, yet a vaccination wasn't made available to me (or my wife who is 4 years older than me) until about 6 weeks ago when we finally got to have our first jab of AstraZeneca. Our PM dropped the ball big time on this whole covid fiasco and I'm convinced the only reason for our low infection numbers is the quick action of each states premiers initiating quick locdowns. I hope the PM enjoys his time left in power because I'd be gobsmacked if he managed to get re-elected, assuming he bothers to try.
Oh, and no, I wasn't infected. I got an SMS giving me the all-clear about 24 hours later. I kind of knew that anyway as my symptoms had disappeared completely by the following morning.
