Placer County is opening two new coronavirus testing sites. Exact locations to be announced

Placer County is opening two coronavirus testing sites next week that will double the county’s testing capacity and contribute to the broader program to boost testing statewide.

Announced by county officials Friday, one site will be in South Placer’s Roseville, and the other in Kings Beach in the Lake Tahoe region. A third site in Nevada County’s Grass Valley will also be able to serve nearby Placer County residents.

The new testing sites will be appointment only, through a yet-to-be-released web portal and phone line run by OptumServe, a private health services company that the state has partnered with, according to county spokeswoman Katie Combs-Prichard.

The exact locations of the testing sites has not been released, and won’t be publicized until appointments “become available,” according to the Friday county press release. It’s unclear whether the testing sites are a drive-through operation, or whether people take the test indoors.

The new testing sites are among more than 80 community testing sites statewide that California Gov. Gavin Newsom previously announced would come online the first week of May. The expanded testing is meant to target harder-to-reach Californians, those in both rural and urban areas, where it would take up to an hour to reach an existing testing site or hospital.

Newsom has said more robust testing of the coronavirus — a goal of 60,000 to 80,000 per day — is a key factor in determining when to lift his stay-at-home order. Public health officials have said that widespread testing is a critical way to better understand how the pandemic is spreading, and who it’s affecting most.

At maximum capacity, the new sites will increase total testing capacity by more than 10,500 tests per day, to a total of more than 25,000, according to county officials.

The county is encouraging any resident with symptoms consistent with COVID-19, the disease caused by the virus, to get tested, even if symptoms are mild. Priority will be given, however, to health care workers, law enforcement and other first responders.

“These sites will allow Placer County to dramatically increase testing for individuals who have had limited access to COVID-19 tests up until now, more than doubling our current testing capacity,” said Placer County health officer Dr. Aimee Sisson in a statement.

Yolo County also will get two new coronavirus testing sites as part of the state program.

Neighboring El Dorado County will also have two testing sites operational next week, as part of the statewide plan. So will Yolo County, which will have sites in Woodland and West Sacramento. Sacramento County has been operating a drive-through test site at Cal Expo in partnership with Verily since the end of March.

In the four-county Sacramento region, more than 1,400 people have been infected with the coronavirus.

This story was originally published May 1, 2020 at 1:45 PM.