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Private Labs Not Running At Capacity During Testing Shortages

SACRAMENTO (CBS13) — In December, UC Davis got new equipment that can pump out up to 2,000 tests a day.

"Because of the magnitude of the issue that we're dealing with, we knew we really need to depend on our partners," said Dr. Olivia Kasiyre.

Those issues include up to 14 days of testing delays. Now Sacramento County is following in the footsteps of states like New York, working with private labs to increase testing capacity.

UC Davis Health is in full-on collaboration mode, they say, to take the pressure off of public testing labs.

"When we developed this partnership it was because they had expanded capacity and wanted to be able to utilize that," said Dr. Kasiyre.

Now, you'll see an additional four testing sites popping up across the county with this partnership.

The UC Davis lab can pump out 2,000 tests a day in their labs, but right now, they're doing about 500 a day. So why are people having such a hard time getting tests when the UC Davis lab isn't even reaching testing capacity?

Leaders at UC Davis say there are shortages on supplies, something Dr. Kasiyre says is often referred to as "reagents" which keeps labs running below their capacity. These are other supplies the lab needs to complete certain viral tests.

Dr. Kasiyre says many tests regionally are being handled by national labs seeing shortages and a long turnaround time, impacting local labs both public and private.

She says there will be 10 testing sites total by the end of this expansion. Four of them will be up and running by Monday.

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