Riverside County opens drive-up coronavirus testing site outside of Lake Elsinore’s Diamond stadium

Dozens of nurses and other medical personnel dressed in protective gear started testing people for the coronavirus during drive-through screening in Lake Elsinore on Saturday.

Over 250 people were expected to get tested during the screening this weekend, according to Riverside County public health officials. They were required to stay in their vehicles for the tests.

The testing site comes as Inland Empire public health officials are trying to expand testing for COVID-19. As of Friday, there were 28 confirmed cases of coronavirus in Riverside County, including four people that have died.

In coordination with the county, Riverside University Health System Public Health and Lake Elsinore, the drive-up testing began on Saturday at Diamond Stadium and will run through at least Sunday, from 9:30 a.m. to 3 p.m. Testing will only be available to those who have symptoms and then they must call 1-800-945-6171 to schedule an appointment before showing up.

Those without without appointments won’t be accommodated.

By 9 a.m.,  cars were lined up on Diamond Drive ready to be screened. The testing site has two lanes where drivers were asked to keep their windows up, until medical personnel, dressed in protective gear, administered nasal swabs to people in vehicles. The  process takes 5-10 minutes and test results will be available within two to four days.

Over 75 nurses and medical personnel from throughout the county were at Saturday’s testing site dressed in face masks, gloves, goggles and gowns. According to city officials, many of them are volunteers from local hospitals and clinics.

The county’s coronavirus appointment hotline has been flooded with calls of people worrying that they may have the virus, according to Dr. Mahbuba Khan, a family medicine specialist, part of a team of doctors that was helping with Saturday’s drive-up clinic. She said phone screening is done before an individual can come get tested. Various symptoms include fever, sore throat, cough, runny nose or congestion.

“They’re calling our 1-800 number and many of them are scared and are asking to get tested,” Khan said.”So we have a team that is screening them on the phone and a lot of people who don’t meet the criteria, we are telling them to stay home.”

There is a possibility that testing can be extended past Sunday but nothing is confirmed just yet, according to John Welsh, Media Relations & Social Media Strategies for Riverside County.

“I think the plan is to have this open for as long as we need to do testing,” Welsh said. “It all depends on needs right now. Every county, every city and every state is dealing with this growing issue right now and things are changing all the time. We’ll have a more definitive timetable at the end of the weekend.”

Brian Tisdale, mayor of Lake Elsinore, said that there hasn’t been much pushback from residents concerning opening the site in their own backyard. He wanted to remind people that containing the virus will be a community effort and it will take time to help defeat the pandemic.

“We haven’t heard a lot of pushback from the community and our City Council reached out to people and told them what we’re doing,” Tisdale said. “What I want people to understand is that the coronvirus is out already and our medical officials will take every measure to ensure our public safety.”

The clinical site in Lake Elsinore becomes the second drive-up coronvirus testing facility in Riverside County, following the lead of one taking place in the Coachella Valley at the Southwest Church in Indian Wells, which started on Wednesday.

 

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