PEORIA, Ill. — With three COVID-19 drive-thru testing sites now up and running in Peoria, hours have been updated.
The East Bluff Wisconsin Ave. site and John Gwynn Park site will each be open 9 A.M.-4 P.M., Monday through Friday.
The Peoria City/County Health Department will continue to operate on weekends only, 10 A.M.-2 P.M., on both Saturdays and Sundays.
The tri-county positive coronavirus case count has risen to 117. Peoria County was reporting 69 cases, Woodford remained at 11, and Tazewell reported 37.
Of the 69 cases in Peoria County, 38 percent were attached to a congregate living situation.
“Again, demonstrating how this is a high-risk population,” said Health Administrator Monica Hendrickson.
Ten of the 69 cases have been identified through the local drive-thru testing sites.
Hendrickson said 168 tests in total were administered between Saturday and Sunday at the East Bluff and Health Department sites.
Those sites give the traditional nasal swab tests.
Hendrickson cautioned against electing for antibody tests.
“There’s currently no CDC guideline on how to interpret these tests, which is really key,” she said.
“Likewise, when some [labs] post they are FDA approved, there are two types of FDA approval going on right now: emergency use authorization. Right now, there are about seven that are EUA, and a very much certified lab has to be able to provide these tests.
“The ones that are saying they’re just FDA approved, without that EUA listed to it, they were allowed to fast track into that process as part of the COVID response, and as such, they were automatically listed as these high-complexity tests.”
She explained what that means.
“They still need to go through stringent validation processes, meaning they haven’t been validated.
“The processes include things like testing on accuracy, sensitivity, specificity, and cross-reaction.”
She said none of OSF St. Francis, UnityPoint, and Heartland were considering using antibody tests because of these concerns.
