Nova Scotia to offer pop-up rapid testing in Dartmouth this weekend, Wolfville next week

Nova Scotia has provided a better picture of their plans to offer pop-up COVID-19 rapid-testing sites in the province over the coming days.

The pop-up testing has a few requirements; individuals must be at least 16-years-old, have no COVID-19 symptoms, have not recently travelled, have had no contact with someone who has COVID-19 and have not been at a location with a potential COVID-19 exposure.

The goal is to detect how much virus is in the community, Dr. Lisa Barrett, an infectious disease specialist at Dalhousie University, told Global News earlier this week.

Barrett is taking charge of the pop-up rapid testing centres, which began last weekend at The Dome, a nightclub in downtown Halifax, and continued at Dalhousie University’s Sexton Campus this week.

“What we’ve been doing here is testing people with no symptoms with rapid tests and training people who aren’t health-care professionals to do those tests for us,” she said.

If someone does test positive from the rapid-testing they are directed to self-isolate and take a more accurate test offered at regular testing locations.

The province tweeted on Friday that it will carry out rapid-testing at the Dartmouth North Community Centre on Saturday between 10 a.m. and 6 p.m.

On Sunday, pop-up rapid testing will be held at the Woodlawn Library in Dartmouth between 10 a.m. and 6 p.m.

On Monday, the province will hold rapid-testing in Wolfville, N.S., although a location and time were still to be determined.

The decision to test in Wolfville comes after new research detected the presence of COVID-19 in that town’s wastewater.

“This research is still experimental so can’t be considered definitive. But it could be a signal that COVID-19 is present in our community,” said the Town of Wolfville in a press release on Friday.

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Fredericton-based company LuminUltra along with researchers from Dalhousie University have been testing sewage in Wolfville through a partnership with Acadia University.

The company says that testing sewage is portable and less costly than traditional laboratory testing.

Nova Scotia Health has also advertised drop-in COVID-19 testing at the Zatzman Sportsplex in Dartmouth on Saturday.

That testing is being targeted at those who have no symptoms but were at bars/restaurants after 10 p.m., or who have visited a confirmed site of potential COVID-19 exposure.

With files from Global News’ Karla Renic