Brakes hit on plan to close Covid testing sites

A strategy to sustain ‘high levels’ of COVID-19 testing in western Sydney could be derailed by a ‘risky’ decision to shut down two drive-through clinics.

Acting NSW Premier John Barilaro in Sydney on Monday. Picture: Gaye Gerard

Health officials say they will not shut down two COVID-19 drive-through clinics in Sydney’s west — where residents are being urged to seek a test for even the mildest of symptoms — after the Acting Premier, John Barilaro, urged more people to get swabbed following a drop in the daily testing rate.

NSW officially recorded zero new locally acquired COVID-19 cases on Monday from 22,275 tests, but two late cases, which will be included in Tuesday’s numbers, are both linked to the Berala cluster in western Sydney.

In a statement late on Monday, the Western Sydney Local Health District said two drive-through clinics at Auburn and Merrylands, in addition to a further 26 testing sites, would be open to the public for the foreseeable future.

“The drive-through clinics at Auburn and Merrylands Park are open seven days a week from 8am to 8pm,” the statement read.

“We are committed to providing safe, easy and convenient ­access to testing for all and have extended operating hours across many of our clinics, including ­Auburn and Merrylands, to support more people to get tested.

“These sites will remain open and we are also prepared to open additional clinics if necessary.”

On Monday, Kerry Chant, the NSW Chief Health Officer, said contact tracers could miss critical “chains of transmission” if daily testing numbers continued to drop.

“We need to have those high rates of testing because even if you were exposed, some people will only develop the illness up to 14 days since their last exposure,” Dr Chant said.

“We need those testing rates to be maintained at very high levels to give us that assurance we’re not missing those undetected … transmission.”

NSW Health had previously advised on its website that testing hours would be reduced slightly at the Auburn and Merrylands Park clinics, less than a week after officials detected the first case in the Berala cluster, which grew to 15 on Monday.

NSW Health said it “expects more cases” to emerge from the cluster, given the large number of people — at least 2000 — who ­attended the BWS store in Berala over an 11-day period.

Mr Barilaro, the acting premier while Gladys Berejiklian is on leave, said on Monday that the state’s testing numbers remained “far too low”.

“Let’s see how as a state we can actually again bring the numbers up — 30, 40, 50,000,” he said.

“If we are going to succeed ­in staying ahead of the COVID pandemic, testing is crucial in large numbers.”

Professor Mike Toole, an epidemiologist at the Burnet Institute, said recording 30,000 daily tests could be achieved only if health officials maintained an “ironclad” testing regime.

“NSW Health wants to increase, if not maintain, the number of people getting tested, and they’ve even spoken about 30,000 tests as a minimum,” Professor Toole said.

“It’s an ambitious goal, so they’ll need to make sure they keep pop-up clinics in the area of most serious concern — Cum­berland — open for as long as necessary.”

Anyone in contact with those who had visited the BWS — ­potentially tens of thousands of people — must also isolate until test results are returned negative.