The provincial government released its next phase of testing strategy on Friday, expanding testing across more locations throughout the province for the general public, frontline workers and others.
ONTARIO - The Province is implementing the next phase of testing strategy for COVID-19.
On Friday, Premier Doug Ford and Deputy Premier and Minister of Health, Christine Elliott released Protecting Ontarians Through Enhanced Testing.
The next phase will have the following three branches of testing.
1 Assessment Centre Testing: expanding who gets tested to now include asymptomatic individuals concerned about exposure and continued routine symptomatic testing at assessment centres.
2 Targeted Campaigns: detecting and containing cases by expanding asymptomatic surveillance for vulnerable populations, including in long-term care homes and other shared living spaces like shelters and group homes, as well as targeted testing of workplaces in priority sectors which work with priority populations and where it may be difficult to physically distance.
3 Outbreak Management: testing to ensure rapid and agile response capacity for outbreak management, including in specific neighbourhoods and regions or at hospitals, institutions and workplaces.
Premier Ford says the next phase will help prevent the spread of the virus.
"Ontario now has the most open and robust testing criteria in the entire country. In fact, anyone who feels they need a test will be able to get a test. We can't manage what we can't measure, and our newly expanded testing strategy is our best defence against stopping the spread of COVID-19 as we gradually and safely reopen the province. More proactive testing will give employers and their employees confidence as they return to work and will fortify our alert system for any potential surge in new cases."
Testing will now be available in more locations across Ontario.
Together, these branches of testing will support the Ontario's regions' extensive efforts to reduce the rate of transmission, also known as instantaneous reproduction number, or Rt.
To help get more access to routine symptomatic testing, people won't need a referral to go to any of the more 130 assessment centres across the province. You can find more Information about the assessment centres here.
Minister Elliott says she encourages people to continue practice physical distancing, even with negative test results.
"The significant expansion of testing of symptomatic and asymptomatic individuals will go hand in hand with public health units' ongoing contact tracing and case management efforts to stop the spread of the virus and keep our families and our communities safe. I just want to caution people, although your test may be negative, you must continue to practice physical distancing, wear a face covering when physical distancing is a challenge, and wash your hands regularly. These simple actions will help keep everyone safe and healthy."
Proactive surveillance testing will also be expanded to detect outbreaks and actively monitor any spread among the most vulnerable populations in hospitals, long-term care homes, group homes, shelters, emergency child care centres, correctional facilities and other shared living spaces.
This will include testing of symptomatic and asymptomatic residents and frontline staff in long-term care and retirement homes, as well as first responders, essential workers and other workplaces as the economy gradually reopens.
Moving forward, the Province expects that private and public resources will be leveraged by private-sector workplace testing, as the government works with private-sector employers to develop the appropriate models for each sector and workplace.
Rural, remote and Indigenous communities will also have further proactive surveillance testing.
The provincial government is developing agile testing resources as well, should an outbreak be declared in a specific neighbourhood, region, institution or workplace.
One of the resources would be mobile testing teams who can be deployed to communities across the province quickly to enhance existing outbreak management.
A renewed strategy will be released soon to support public health units with case management and contact tracing, including launching a new exposure notification app that will alert people in Ontario when they may have been exposed to COVID-19 and would recommend appropriate actions.
Among these actions would include monitoring for symptoms, self-isolation and/or appropriate next steps on getting tested.
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