A local businessman is hoping to have private COVID-19 testing available to employers by June.
Paul Antle owns Avalon Laboratories, a nationally-accredited and Health Canada approved facility that is the only private laboratory in the province.
They have ISO certification and Containment Level II certification that allows them to manage and handle biohazardous samples like COVID-19. The company has been doing microbiology and toxicology testing for years for companies across the province, including oil and gas, energy, food, food processing, fish, and the health care system.
(Photo via Flickr through Creative Commons.)
Antle says there was no capacity in the province to test for COVID-19 until very recently. He says manufacturing has ramped up and the shortage in swabs seen back in March is no longer an issue. The bottleneck according to Antle, remains access to PCR technology, which currently has a wait-list.
Antle says there is a demand from employers who are looking for testing of asymptomatic workers as the economy ramps up. The company won’t administer the tests, but they will analyze the swabs.
He believes that can provide what he calls “valuable” information for Public Health, as the provincial government currently will not test people who are asymptomatic.
