CORPUS CHRISTI, Texas — You or someone you know might have taken a PCR test, and while it's normal for results to take a few days, some Coastal Bend residents have been waiting upwards of a week.
Some people have even claimed their results were lost.
We spoke with Dr. Onufrak of the Public Health Department to see if there was any substance to these claims.
"We're testing six days a week, we're having a thousand people come in, resources do get stretched in and we can't always follow that 24 hour rule," Dr. Onufrak said, "Sometimes it's going to take maybe a week, unfortunately. We might be back to where, if you feel sick you should just stay home"
So no, the tests haven't been lost. There's really just been that many of them taken over the last few weeks.
Dr. Onufrak says the health department is getting help from a third party lab, but they're backed up as well.
We reported on how you can help take strain off the testing sites by ordering a free at-home test from the federal government.
This has been a huge undertaking in combating the COVID-19 pandemic, and while the knowledge is important to have, officials are asking for patience from the community.
It's an issue several labs are having but folks will get their results. In the meantime:
"If you have to be somewhere, then you need to be masked. You need to social distance; you need to be masked. If you haven't been vaccinated, you need to get it. There's only so much that we can do, we really need help from the public."
But if you really need a test, you can find the locations below.
For the latest updates on coronavirus in the Coastal Bend, click here.
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