COVID-19: How will the trial test work in Saskatchewan? | The Canadian News

On Thursday, Saskatchewan Prime Minister Scott Moe made it very clear that Saskatchewan will once again have a mask mandate.

It also announced a new COVID-19 testing policy in the province that had far fewer details.

The premise seems simple: You will need to show proof of vaccination or present a recent negative COVID-19 test when entering places like restaurants, bars and gyms (but not other places like supermarkets and places of worship) starting on 1 October.

And he said the province will not pay for the tests.

“It is up to you to purchase, pay, and find the private provider to provide you with that proof,” he said, near the end of the press conference.

“You need a healthcare provider to provide it. And the rest of the province, through the Saskatchewan Health Authority, will not pay for that test. “

He then said that people should get their tests from private providers.

The fact that the requirement to take a recent test is now a necessity and no longer a recommendation raises many questions.

Presumably, the demand for evidence would increase.

But the lines for the Saskatoon test site already take hours to arrive.

And if an unvaccinated person has to pay for their own test, that may mean that they cannot be tested by SHA, a taxpayer-funded entity.

So will SHA staff now review vaccination statuses? Will they reject someone who does not have both doses?

Moe said the government is developing the policies.

A president of a company that offers COVID-19 testing, one of the few that does so in the province, said they were very busy before Thursday’s announcement testing people who want to travel, American hunters and people who work for mining operations. .

“Every day we get more and more requests from workplaces,” said Shirley Galloway, speaking from Oxbow, SK.

Galloway is the president of Nobel HSSE Ltd., an occupational health and safety company. It said it employs about 25 testers at three sites across the province.

“We were fully booked a few days ago to test for the cycling game in both Regina and Saskatoon and we deployed mobile tests. So that really drowned us out, ”he told Global News.

Speaking the day after the announcement, he said he has already received six calls about regular workplace testing.

“These are 200 to 1,000 workers that people want to get tested,” he explained.

A key component of testing availability will be frequency – how often the government or employer wants someone to get tested.

Another problem is cost. Galloway said a rapid antigen test, which takes about 40 minutes in total, costs $ 90.

The PCR test, which takes about 12 hours and which Galloway referred to as the gold standard of COVID-19 testing, costs about $ 350 for same-day results.

The first analyzes COVID antigens, that is, what the body creates when the virus infects it, and the second analyzes the genetic material of the virus.

Galloway said medical professionals use PCR tests to confirm a positive antigen test.

He also emphasized that the SHA only allows private testing sites to test asymptomatic people. All people experiencing symptoms should contact the 811 health line and get tested.

Global News asked the government and SHA for more details on the announcement and the questions listed above, as well as several others.

None responded before the deadline.

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