CORONAVIRUS REGIONAL TESTING CENTRE OPENS FOR KEY WORKERS

Preston’s College is proud to continue supporting key workers, as the St Vincent’s Road car park is transformed into a temporary coronavirus testing facility.

This is part of the UK Government’s national drive to increase testing for key workers.

The drive-in facility, operated independently of the college, will initially provide testing for NHS frontline staff and other critical key workers in the form of self-administered and administered tests.

Speaking, Preston’s College Principal and Chief Executive Officer Dr Lis Smith, commented:

“We are extremely proud to provide the additional use of one of our car parks as a testing centre at this crucial time. When our staff and learners temporarily moved to home and online working, we decided to offer whatever help we could to the NHS and key workers, providing full access to parking spaces for local hospital staff and visitors. Whilst our contribution to the wider NHS efforts is relatively small, we feel it is important to help our community in any way that we can.”

 Professor John Newton, National Coordinator for the UK Coronavirus Testing Strategy, said:

“New testing sites such as this one are a key pillar of our 5-pillar plan to scale up testing, and are critical in supporting NHS staff who are isolating at home to return safely to work if the test is negative.”

“This is a brilliant example of industries and businesses turning their resources to creating and rolling out mass testing at scale, which will help to deliver on our aim of carrying out 100,000 tests a day across the UK by the end of the month.”

The Preston’s College testing centre is being operated in partnership with G4S and Boots, and is offering self-administered and administered tests. Those tested will receive their results within a few days.

Health Minister Lord Bethell added:

“The Government is rapidly scaling up the national effort to boost testing capacity for coronavirus to protect the vulnerable, support our NHS, and ultimately save lives.

“This is a national effort and we are proud to be working with a number of partners to turn this ambition into a reality and roll out additional capacity to where it is needed.”