ORANGE COUNTY, Fla. – The Florida Department of Health announced it plans to roll out a new mobile coronavirus testing program to five locations in Orange County.
Dr. Raul Pino made the announcement Monday as the number of people testing positive for the coronavirus in Orange County exceeded 1,000.
"The sites were geographically selected taking into consideration the heat map -- the areas where we have the highest health disparities," he said.
Pino said his team is looking at the following five locations: West Orange Park, Blanchard Park, South Econ Park, Barnett Park and Camping World Stadium.
"We are expecting to do about 250 to 300 tests a day at each of the sites," he said.
Pino said the tests will be free of charge and open to anyone who makes an appointment.
"We don’t want people to be waiting in line for five hours to be tested," he said. "We are going to stagger them because the temperatures are getting hot, and we want to protect our employees, as well as the public."
Pino said his team is still trying to access the collection kits and determine the dates when the mobile testing will take place.
He said he was hopeful to have more details in a couple days.
"I think it's a pretty good thing because I feel more people will get checked," Jacqueline Howe said.
Howe lives near South Econ Park in Orange County. She said it would be a good idea if a mobile testing site does open at the park so that more people can get tested for COVID-19.
“With the coronavirus you don’t know if you even had it already or because of the symptoms sometimes aren’t even noticed,” Howe said.
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