Crush The Curve Idaho to ramp up testing, expects hundreds more coronavirus cases
Idaho has seen record-high numbers of confirmed coronavirus infections in June, and one group expects the wave to grow.
Crush The Curve Idaho plans to open two new testing sites in the Treasure Valley in the next several days — one in Eagle and one in East Boise — ahead of “what could be a major spike in COVID-19 cases in the coming days and weeks,” it said Thursday. The site addresses will be announced later.
Crush The Curve also plans to do more testing at its main site, Saltzer Health in Meridian. It plans to put antibody testing on hold to focus on COVID-19 viral tests, which can detect active infections.
Since launching its online COVID-19 screening questionnaire in mid-April, Crush The Curve says it has noticed a relationship between the number of people who fill out the questionnaire and the number of new cases reported statewide about a week later. A recent surge in people filling out the questionnaire caught the group’s attention.
“So far this week our daily number of viral assessments is more than double what we saw last week, which was double from the week before that,” said Tina Upson, Crush The Curve Idaho’s executive director. “So, when we see a trend like this, we know we have to get ready to deploy more resources.”
The group says it predicts at least 1,600 Idahoans will test positive between June 24 and July 2, mostly in the Treasure Valley.
Just over 80,000 coronavirus tests have been completed in Idaho since late February. More than 4,405 people have tested positive. Another 499 are presumed to have the disease.
Despite testing recommendations from the state that estimate Idaho would need to test about 43,000 people a week for just two of its five highest-priority groups, Idaho only did about 41,000 tests in the past month. Idaho has the lowest rate of coronavirus testing per capita in the U.S.
Crush The Curve says it has enough test kits and laboratory capacity to do more than 16,000 tests a day. But Upson said it would need medical providers and/or state support to actually get that many people tested, for staffing and insurance reasons.
