Missoula Will Begin Asymptomatic Testing For COVID-19
As Montana and other states around the country gradually continue to reopen and return to something resembling normal life, there have been some concerns about whether we might see a resurgence in Coronavirus cases in the weeks and months ahead. Are we going to have to do this all over again in a couple of months?
Hopefully that's not the case, and Governor Bullock recently announced his intention to begin COVID-19 testing for people who are asymptomatic (meaning, people who aren't showing symptoms of the disease). Previously, you needed to be showing symptoms in order to get a COVID-19 test in Montana.
Missoula health officer Ellen Leahy believes this should have been happening months ago, and she blames the lack of testing resources at the beginning of the pandemic. And of course, making testing more widely available is a way to help control the outbreak, and get a better sense of what's happening in the community.
For now, testing for asymptomatic people will be restricted to those on the front lines of the pandemic - healthcare workers, grocery workers, etc. It'll then expand until hopefully everyone is able to get a COVID-19 test. Remember, sometimes you can carry the disease and not even know about it if you're not showing symptoms, and that means you can unknowingly spread it to others who might get more affected by it than you did.