04-23-2020, 07:39 PM
(04-23-2020, 06:43 PM)ijmorlan Wrote:(04-23-2020, 03:04 PM)taylortbb Wrote: I agree we're not in a position to open anything. But I think things should be moving in that direction, and I'm concerned they're not.
In any case, my 48 hour saga with public health wasn't about convincing them to test me. Every call started with them going down the testing criteria, and concluding that I met multiple criteria for priority testing, and that I should be tested. It was a crazy 48 hour wild goose chase going from public health telling me "you should be tested" to finally navigating the bureaucracy enough that I was in touch with someone who actually had the authority to authorize the test public health said I needed. Surely you agree that's not how it's supposed to work? We should be testing the people that meet the criteria, not giving them bureaucratic gauntlets to discourage it.
Sounds like a mixed-up process. Ideally, it would be something like “you should have a test. Do you agree?”
“Yes.”
“Can I just confirm your address is [address from health card]?”
[…]
“Can I confirm you will be at home tomorrow morning?”
[…]
“The testing unit will arrive sometime tomorrow morning. Please have your health card ready.”
Or alternately it could be conversation about what location you would like to go to and set up an appointment. But I think there is something to be said for having health officials do the travelling.
That would make lots of sense, except that public health isn't generally authorized to order Covid-19 tests. Provincial rules say public health agencies can only order tests for people without health cards, and for people that are identified through their own contract tracing. Because I was identified through Hamilton's contact tracing Waterloo can't send me for a test. Apparently even if they tried the province would reject the test, because Waterloo didn't identify me. That lead to talking to Hamilton public health, but they can't authorize a test for me in KW. They said if I drove down to Hamilton they might be able to, though they're only supposed to test people in Hamilton, but that obviously I should try KW first.
The only other route is to be referred by a doctor to the Covid-19 assessment centre, which is a converted walk-in clinic beside T&T. Apparently the testing centres at the hospitals are now reserved exlusively for employees of the hospitals, though Telehealth still tried to send me to the GRH testing centre without an appointment. The problem there is I don't have a family doctor. Waterloo Public Health just told me to call random walk-in clinics until I found one that would refer me. However, many aren't doing phone appointments, and those that are just told me to either call public health or GRH. Apparently until recently testing was authorized by public health, and no one knows about this new referral process.
Eventually I found the phone appointment number for the clinic that's been converted in to the assessment centre. They seem to be the only clinic around that's actually aware of the new procedure and was able to refer me. I finally got tested earlier today.