TOPEKA – Governor Laura Kelly announced today that 11 contracts have been awarded in conjunction with the Kansas COVID-19 Unified Testing Strategy supported with SPARK funding.
“Kansas is at a critical point with COVID-19,” Governor Kelly said. “Our communities are continuing to experience a significant amount of cases. Until a vaccine is widely available, one of the most important strategies to protect Kansans and ensure a promising economy is to increase testing.”
“When combined with wearing face masks, extensive testing – along with isolating those who are positive and quarantining close contacts — poses the most probable fighting opportunity to stop the COVID-19 pandemic, especially as we head into the winter months,” according to Dr. Lee Norman, Secretary of the Kansas Department of Health and Environment.
The Kansas Unified Testing Strategy will allow for broader routine screening to stop community spread of the virus and will ensure coordination between public and private testing efforts, including surveillance testing. The strategy includes sourcing the testing supplies and lab capacity, identifying appropriate populations to test, getting the samples and transporting them to the lab, processing and sharing the results, and ensuring that those who test positive are able to isolate.
Each of the 11 contractors will contribute to the overall strategy through implementing specific portions of the strategic plan and testing higher risk populations. Each entity will be responsible for testing in specific populations and counties, beginning next week.
Contracts have been awarded to:
- 4M
- Clinical Reference Lab
- Freestate Logistics
- MAWD
- Medevac
- NicUSA
- Quest
- Sinochips
- University of Kansas Health System
- WellHealth
- Wichita State University