Finding an appointment during the day for a Covid-19 test is now almost impossible. You often have to wait several days. The personnel in the laboratories is not sufficient, in particular during this period of leave. In addition, more and more French people want to be tested. Reasons range from going on vacation, airlines sometimes require a negative test to be presented, to family reunion, or just suspicion of infection. Demand is exploding and capacities are not sufficient.
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The problem will nevertheless have to be resolved, if only to trace the chains of contamination. Solutions exist: the sante.fr website has already been set up by the government. It allows, depending on the geographical area, to have the list of laboratories carrying out the samples and even to make an appointment online.
Tests with doctors and pharmacists?
The start of the school year risks creating real traffic jams at the entrance to the laboratories if there is a new epidemic of influenza or any other virus. Several measures can be considered: it is for example possible to require general practitioners to have swabs in order to be able to do the test directly in the office without going through the laboratory.
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In addition, it will be necessary to study the feasibility of tests at the pharmacist for people who are not sick or for contact cases. Finally, the saliva tests that have been mentioned for a while would make it possible to have a result in just one or two hours and to avoid a painful PCR test. If they were negative, the individuals tested could return to work and the children could be put back in the community.
The site is therefore not yet completely finished. Germany has meanwhile generalized the tests on return to the country, after the departure on vacation of nationals.