Pop-up testing will open in Burlington’s Old North End on Friday, Dec. 11, and a week later, on Dec. 18, the city announced Wednesday.
The pop-up site, located at 294 North Winooski Ave., will offer testing free of charge. Preregistration is encouraged, and appointments can be made through the Vermont Department of Health website, though the pop-up site also serves walk-ins.
“We see this as an important additional, supplemental capacity here in Burlington,” Mayor Miro Weinberger said, noting that there were “important communities” in the Old North End he hoped the pop-up testing would reach.
The city has doubled down on its efforts to expand testing in recent days. On Monday, Burlington opened a new, more long-term Covid test site, in partnership with the state. That site, located at Burlington City Arts on Pine Street, will be open from noon to 8 p.m. daily until at least the end of December.
The University of Vermont will also be continuing to provide weekly testing for students and staff who are remaining in Burlington during the school’s winter break.
UVM’s sustained testing is “significant and important,” Weinberger said, given that a majority of the university’s off-campus students say they plan to remain in Burlington during the winter, along with many faculty and staff.
The announcements come on a record-breaking day for coronavirus cases in Chittenden County. The county reported 55 new cases of the virus on Wednesday, the highest count since early April.
Though UVM Medical Center’s capacity is not yet strained, the surge in cases is being reflected in hospitalizations, said Stephen Leffler, president of the University of Vermont Medical Center. “The last time we had 20 patients in the hospital with Covid was in mid-April. And today, we have 19. So you can see we’re getting back up towards those numbers,” he said.
Even with the rise in hospitalizations, Leffler said fewer patients are in the ICU than in the spring, and currently, none are on ventilators. Patients are “getting better more quickly, and getting out of the hospital more quickly” than in the first weeks of the pandemic.
And UVM Medical Center, Leffler added, has upped its capacity for Covid patients, dedicating a whole floor to care for virus patients, which is not yet full.
Leffler urged continued vigilance in coming weeks, to keep case numbers low and prevent ICU beds from maxing out, as is occurring in other states. “We’re not there yet,” Leffler said. “Vermonters still have a major role to play to keep us from getting there.”
Expanded testing is part of that strategy. The Vermont Department of Health recommends a test for anyone experiencing Covid symptoms, who has come in contact with someone who has tested positive for the virus, or has attended a social gathering with someone from outside of their household.
