CORNER BROOK, N.L. — Perry Bingle was pretty confident that he didn’t have COVID-19 but on Feb. 18 the Deer Lake man headed to Corner Brook to be tested anyway.
Bingle had been in St. John’s from Feb. 6 to 8 when the outbreak of COVID-19 cases in the St. John's area was reported. Within days of returning home to Deer Lake the province reverted back to an Alert Level 5 and schools and businesses shut down.
Then on Feb. 17 Western Health announced it would be holding a rapid testing clinic for COVID-19 at the Valley Mall in Corner Brook and encouraged people who had been to St. John’s since Feb. 3, and/or who attend high school, to get tested.
Falling into that first category is why Bingle decided to get tested, even though he’d only visited with his family and gone to one store and didn’t think he’d been in contact with a COVID-19 case.
“I just went for peace of mind,” he said.
He had gone to work since returning from St. John’s and had heard Dr. Janice Fitzgerald, the province’s chief medical officer of health, talk about the new U.K. variant that had been linked to the outbreak and of people testing positive for the variant while being asymptomatic.
He wanted to make sure he hadn’t exposed anyone in Deer Lake or family members in St. John’s.
Bingle was one of 1,113 people to be tested at the rapid testing site between Feb. 18 and Feb. 22 and was shocked at how easy the process was.
“I think it was a half an hour later, might have been an hour, and I had a text back saying that my test results were negative.” — Perry Bingle
Expecting a long lineup and wait he packed a lunch before driving to the Corner Brook. Once at the site he was greeted and given paperwork to complete, and barely had it finished before he got a text saying they were ready for him.
The staff were friendly and thankful for people getting tested and he was through in no time.
“I think it was a half an hour later, might have been an hour, and I had a text back saying that my test results were negative.”
And Bingle had his peace of mind.
“It is a little nag,” he said. “It’s a little unsettling, that you might have it or that you might have come in contact with anybody (who does have it),” he said.
It wasn’t his first experience with possible contact to someone with COVID-19. Deer Lake experienced a small outbreak last fall and Bingle was a contact of a close contact of a positive case. At that time he self-isolated until his contact’s test came back negative.
The western region currently has four active COVID-19 cases and Dr. Monika Dutt, the medical officer of health for the western and central regions, said at this point there isn’t a particular area of increased concern in Western Health.
She said that’s different than the situation in St. John’s, but still the health authority wanted to pick a location to try using the rapid test for the first time in the region.
“We wanted to get a snapshot of an area of the region.”
It chose the targeted population because of what was being seen in the St. John’s area.
“We wanted to see if there could be any connection with people who travelled to St. John’s in the last two weeks who might have possibly been exposed to COVID-19 and could possibly be developing COVID-19," she said. "And then younger people because that was what was being seen in Eastern health. They have seen quite a lot of students and younger people who connected together through sports and social activities and other ways who were becoming positive.”
All of the 1,113 people tested over the five days were presumptive negative. Dutt said they are considered presumptive because a confirmation test would have to be done at a lab to confirm the result, but there are no plans for further testing.
“At this point the possibility of there being people out there who do have COVID-19, who we haven’t detected, is quite low.”
If there was ever an increased concern because of higher risk then a second test would be performed.
Dutt said the rapid test is a pretty good screening test and while asymptomatic people were targeted, it can also be used for those who have symptoms.
Western Health had a goal of administering 2,000 tests and Dutt said 1,113 was a good number based on the uncertainty of how many people would come.
“It’s a strange time to be asking people to come out and come to a clinic with all the advice not to go places.”
While there are no plans to hold another clinic in the near future, Dutt said Western Health learned a lot from this one should another become necessary.
Diane Crocker reports on west coast news. [email protected] | @WS_DianeCrocker
