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ALBANY, NY (WENY) – Gov. Kathy Hochul wants as many students as possible to get tested for COVID-19. In the coming weeks, the state of New York aims to provide testing kits to every student. Kits are scheduled to be given out the week of Jan. 3.
“We have tools at our disposal and the question is how we’re deploying them,” she said. “I know people are very confident in how we’ve done it…so, we’re continuing to work on our winter surge plan, making more testing available.”
Acting commissioner, New York State Division of Homeland Security & Emergency Services Jackie Bray’s priority is to keep kids in school. Supplied kits will help parents do just that.
“It’s our responsibility to supply as many of our districts as we possibly can so that they can supply as many kids as they possibly can with kits,” she said.
In total, six million test kits will be delivered to 731 school districts across New York State. Testing kits will be available to students next week.
“We’ll be supplying them through 60 different hubs throughout the state and those will include the BOCES, some direct to school districts and some county hubs,” she said. “Planes with these kits begin arriving tomorrow. They will be landing in the state every day this week.”
Commissioner Bray confirmed over 100 trucks will be on the roads to deliver kits to hubs. The delivery of kits will be prioritized on case rate by district.
“We’ll be prioritizing delivery based on case rate by district so that we make sure that the kits get to the districts that are seeing the highest level of transmission,” she said.
Access to testing is also being expanded. Parents can take themselves and their children to testing sites, as well.
“Pharmacies and urgent cares across the state continue to offer testing, including walk-in testing,” she said. “Last week we delivered over a million over the counter tests to county, local health departments outside of New York City.”
Locally, parents in several school districts received notification of the incoming test kits. For more information as to where and when test kits will be available, there will be more updates for respective school districts.
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