Free Antibody Testing Now Available in New York City at Certain Communities
Last week, NYC Mayor Bill de Blasio announced the beginning of an antibody survey. About 70,000 New Yorkers would be tested through the end of May with another 70,000 to begin again in June for a daily total of 5,000. Specific communities have been picked with more testing locations to be added at a later time. It’s unclear, as of the time of this writing, what other communities would be included with the eventual near term addition of testing sites.
“BioReference is supporting the city in its epidemiology studies of the presence of COVID-19 throughout large segments of the New York City population,” said Jon R. Cohen, M.D., Executive Chairman of BioReference Laboratories. “For New York, a city that has been seriously impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic, this type of information will be of great value in helping healthcare professionals to analyze the presence and progression of the disease in order to identify at risk populations for possible early intervention.”
Testing Sites (by appointment ONLY) are in West Harlem in Manhattan, Morrisania in the Bronx, East NY in Brooklyn, Staten Island and Long Island City.
We’ve seen the actual addresses but don’t want to encourage anyone to show up needlessly. It doesn’t work that way. You need to make an appointment by phone or online. Also, these initial tests are geared towards the residents of these communities.
If you’re unable to access the site then you can also make an appointment by calling 888-279-0967
You must be 18 years of age or older and a resident of NYC
Hours:
Monday – Friday, 8:00 am – 8:00 pm
Saturday & Sunday, 9:00 am – 5:00 pm
* Results in 24-48 hrs
The Mayor’s words on May 7:
“We’re going to work with five sites initially, but then we will be adding, and the goal is to focus on people in the general area of these test sites. I want to be very clear. There’s so many people in the city. Any time you set up a test site, tens of thousands of people live very nearby. We want to focus on where the test sites are, not having to have people travel a long way to get to these tests, but we’ll keep adding sites as we go along. So, the sites will be in the Bronx, in Morrisania, in Brooklyn and East New York, and Manhattan, upper Manhattan, Staten Island in Concorde, and Queens in Long Island City. 1000 tests per site every day. Again, 70,000 tests will be given in the space of about two weeks, and then we’ll repeat that again.”
“Now, how does someone get this test? You get it by appointment. Again, the priority given to the surrounding communities and the hotline for making the appointments will be launched this Friday, tomorrow. Now, how does it work? You give basic information, because remember this is to benefit you as an individual, but also to get us information on what has been happening with this disease so we can fight it. So, people will be asked demographic information, employment information, very important. We want to understand how the disease has hit people in different parts of our economy, in different parts of the life of this city. It’s a simple procedure. A nurse takes a blood sample, you get your individual result back in 24 to 48 hours. So, even though this is the kind of thing, this testing and the PCR testing is what would have made so much of a difference early on, and could have fundamentally changed the history of this disease in this city if we had had it early. It still helps us now to learn more and more, and obviously to give more and more New Yorkers the confidence in knowing their own situation. So, we will keep you posted as more and more details come out, but I’m looking forward to between the two kinds of testing becoming more of a norm in this city every day that people are getting to those tests and we’re getting a better and better picture, and it’s all going to contribute to our efforts on testing and tracing, which are going to be developing rapidly in this month.”
The information provided on their webpage is as follows:
COVID-19 Antibody Screening for New York City Residents
BioReference Laboratories and New York City (NYC) have partnered to expand access to COVID-19 antibody (serology) testing. Testing is available only to NYC residents 18 years of age and over in all five boroughs.
Getting started is easy. Simply click the button below to answer a few screening questions to determine if you are eligible to participate. If you are eligible, we will help you schedule an appointment at the nearest location.
If you wish to receive free antibody testing under this testing program (the “NYC Testing Program”), you must complete the screening questions. Answering these questions is a condition of receiving the test without charge. If you do not wish to answer these questions, or if you are not eligible for participation in the NYC Testing Program based on your answers, the NYC Testing Program cannot schedule a blood draw for you at this time. You can contact your health care provider if you want to discuss testing.
Please note that people under the age of 18 and people who are not NYC residents are not eligible to participate in this program.