By Tim Mastro

WILMINGTON — Delaware is working with federal partners to increase access to COVID-19 testing in the upcoming weeks.

A.J. Schall, director of the Delaware Emergency Management Agency, said the state anticipates opening one mass testing site per county which will be managed by federal officials. If this request is approved, these sites would remain open for two or three weeks. Mr. Schall said the state hopes these plans will be finalized by the end of the week.

Mr. Schall added this would increase the state’s testing capacity by about 10,000-15,000 tests per week.

Delaware is seeing such a high demand for COVID-19 testing after a post-holiday surge in cases. The state processed 53,923 tests during the final week of the year at its Curative sites alone — more than double the amount of tests it did the final week of November.

Numerous testing sites downstate canceled appointments Monday do to a winter storm. A list of testing sites and updates are available at de.gov/gettested and Curative.com.

In an effort to create more appointments, Mr. Schall asked those who test positive to not retest a few days later.

“The testing is out there, we need to make sure it’s out there for people that need it,” Mr. Schall said. “We don’t need people going on a Monday, testing positive and going back Wednesday, taking a spot in line, because they want to see if it’s a false positive.”

Delaware Division of Public Health director Dr. Karyl Rattay added those who have tested positive within the last three months or are fully vaccinated and boosted and should not seek out testing unless they have symptoms.

“Right now we want to make sure that those who really need to get tested have access to tests,” Dr. Rattay said. “Especially those who have symptoms or those who have been exposed to someone with COVID and those who are at higher risk who may benefit from some of the medications that are available.”

Delaware’s COVID-19 positivity rate has doubled over the last seven days worth of data. The state’s seven-day rolling average for percentage of positive tests is up to 26.9% compared to 13.1% a week prior. The latest number is as of Saturday at 6 p.m. due to a two-day lag to account for the time delay between the date of the test and the date that DPH receives the test result.

DPH reported 2,265 new cases in Tuesday’s update, which reflects data as of Monday at 6 p.m. The state is averaging 2,584.3 new cases per day over the last seven days which is a record. That number was down at 734.1 new cases per day two weeks ago.

Delaware has recorded 191,649 total positive cases throughout the pandemic and 2,286 COVID-19-related deaths. No additional deaths were reported in Tuesday’s update.