DUVAL COUNTY, Fla. — Health experts are concerned about the post-New Year’s COVID-19 surge following the holiday weekend.
Robin Boone stopped off at the Neptune Beach Telescope COVID-19 testing site just before 7 a.m. on Monday.
Boone needed to get a COVID-19 test before flying out to Panama.
“They require a test to come in 72 hours prior,” Boone said.
When he got to the parking lot, it was packed.
Our Action News Jax SkyVision Drone flew over this testing site, and you can see there were at least four lanes of cars waiting.
“We expected a line but not as bad as it is,” Boone said.
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We saw the last car getting through the line at 11:15 a.m. The testing site had reached capacity at around 8:30 a.m.
Telescope Health told Action News Jax last week that it anticipated long lines of people wanting to get tested on Monday, especially coming off a busy New Year’s holiday.
Neptune Beach police were called out to help direct traffic this morning, so cars didn’t spill onto Atlantic Boulevard.
Telescope Health even tweeted that “due to the high volume of testing being requested by the community the Neptune Beach testing site will be operating on a first come first serve basis and will be limiting the number of rapid tests to 150 and PCR tests to 100 per day.”
Luckily, Boone made the cutoff.
“We’re traveling. We’re about to jump on a plane tomorrow morning so we have to get a test,” Boone said.
But others were not so lucky and were turned away.
Telescope Health will reopen again Tuesday at 7 a.m.
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Action News Jax did reach out to the other city-funded sites to find out how many tests were administered.
Agape Health’s main office was closed Monday so it could not give us an answer about its Lane Wiley and Clanzel Brown testing sites.
We also reached out to the Department of Health, which leases two city properties for testing.
We are still waiting to hear back from Emmett Reed Community Center and Cuba Hunter Community Center.
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