CHICAGO — Another COVID-19 testing site has opened on the Near West Side.
People will not need to have symptoms to get a PCR test at the site, which is on the University of Illinois at Chicago’s campus, according to a UI Health news release. The site opened last week, offering nasal and saliva tests.
Results will be emailed to patients within 48 hours, according to UI Health. The site also has rapid, self-test kits.
Testing there is available 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays and 9 a.m.-4 p.m. Tuesdays, Thursdays and Sundays in parking lot E at 820 S. Paulina St. Registration is available at the site.
The city also recently opened two other sites, both Downtown.
The openings come after weeks of Chicagoans struggling to get tested during this wave of COVID-19 — and the sites didn’t open until Chicago was already coming down from its peak of Omicron cases.
Officials advised Chicagoans to get tested if they wanted to gather with family and friends during the holiday season. But the city shut down many of the testing sites it ran last year, health clinics and doctors offices were booked up and stores were sold out of at-home tests.
Many Chicagoans said they felt like they were forced to turn to questionable, for-profit pop-up testing sites.
Block Club has revealed numerous issues at such sites, and multiple Chicago-based testing companies — including the Center for COVID Control and O’Hare Clinical Lab — are now facing mounting customer complaints and federal and state investigations.
Chicagoans told Block Club they are frustrated the city, state and federal governments didn’t do more to prepare for testing for a fall and winter surge, especially since officials had predicted such a surge.
The city’s health department is still urging people to get tested if they have COVID-19 symptoms or have been in contact with someone with the virus. Cases, hospitalizations and deaths remain high.
People can go online to get more information about testing.
Vaccinations:
• In Illinois, about 7.9 million people — or 62 percent of the state’s 12.7 million people — are fully vaccinated against COVID-19, according to state data.
• Across the state, 36,787 vaccine doses are being administered per day, based on a seven-day rolling average.
• Illinois and Chicago have administered at least 20,423,100 vaccine doses of the 23,092,645 provided to them.
• City data shows more than 1.7 million Chicagoans — or 66.5 percent of all residents — are fully vaccinated, and 74.8 percent of all Chicagoans have gotten at least one shot.
Everyone 5 and older is eligible to get vaccinated in Chicago.
COVID-19 vaccinations are free and do not require insurance. Anyone can call the city’s coronavirus hotline at 312-746-4835 to get more information on how and where to get vaccinated in their community.
The numbers:
• Since Thursday, 120 Illinoisans were reported dead from COVID-19.
• At least 30,688 people have died from COVID-19 in Illinois, and another 3,751 deaths are probably related to the virus, according to the state.
• The state reported 15,453 cases since Thursday. That brings the total number of confirmed cases in Illinois up to 2,897,174.
• Since Thursday, 215,068 tests were reported statewide. In all, 50,798,837 tests have been reported in Illinois.
• Illinois’ seven-day case positivity rate was at 9.4 percent. The figure represents the percentage of people testing positive among recent tests.
• Illinois’ seven-day test positivity rate, which measures the percentage of tests that were positive, was at 12 percent.
• As of Thursday night, 800 people with COVID-19 were in the ICU and 460 people with COVID-19 were using ventilators in Illinois.
• In Chicago, 13 deaths were reported since Thursday. There have been at least 6,877 deaths from COVID-19 in Chicago. The city is seeing an average of 19 people dying per day, down 22 percent from a week ago.
• Chicago has had 1,534 confirmed cases reported since Monday. It’s had a total of 541,074 confirmed cases. An average of 1,543 confirmed cases are being reported per day, down 50 percent from a week ago.
• Testing in Chicago is down 6 percent from a week ago.
• Chicago’s positivity rate was at 6.8 percent, down from 11.9 percent a week ago.
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