Mayor Harry Kim and other county workers were screened for COVID-19 on Wednesday as a test of the county’s mobile testing unit.
The mobile unit — comprised of three vans — will be fully deployed in early December, allowing teams to test remote or vulnerable communities for COVID-19. The unit will be integrated into the county’s drive-through testing sites around the island.
“This mobile testing is an expansion of the county’s testing program because it adds another resource to the community,” Kim said in a statement. “The mobile testing enables us to expand testing as needed, and gives us great flexibility in doing it.”
Kim said the county has the highest rate of COVID tests in the state, with more than 22% of the island’s population having been tested already.
In addition, Clinical Labs of Hawaii is now able to process COVID tests on the island using a new analyzer that can process up to 1,000 tests in a day, with next-day results.