David Hall waited outside Ellis Davis Field House early Sunday, hoping to get checked for the new coronavirus during Dallas County’s second day of mobile testing.
He said he had a temperature of 99.7 and symptoms of the virus since Thursday, but he was turned away. The tests were available only to people who are 65 or older or a first responder, health care worker or Dallas Area Rapid Transit bus driver. Hall is only 49 and he’s a postal worker.
“They’re not getting people tested, and so all we can do is just stay home," he said. “That’s going to be the best remedy — to just stay home.”
The highly anticipated testing began Saturday at American Airlines Center near downtown Dallas. At both locations, medical personnel performed the tests quickly on people inside their vehicles, but it wasn’t uncommon for people to be turned away Sunday.
Patients were screened to see whether their temperatures registered 99.6 or higher, and within the first hour more than half of about 60 vehicles that passed through were turned away.
A city official said earlier this week that the site would be able to conduct 2,400 tests, but workers at the Red Bird-area field house declined to comment on how many people were being checked.
Calvin and Jo Berry, both in their 70s, decided to get tested as a precaution. He works in the construction business, and though he maintains his distance from people to avoid infection, he’s still worried.
But they were turned away because they didn’t have a fever, which left Calvin disappointed.
“I think going to the doctor is a good thing," he said. "If I have it, I don’t want to spread it to somebody.”
Jan Barr, 70, was among the people who got the clearance to move to the testing tent.
“The swab is very painful 'cause it goes all the way into your nasal cavity,” she said. “It is painful, but I understand it and it’s acceptable to me because I’d that rather do that than expose other people.”
Barr, who woke up Sunday with a dry cough, was told she would receive her results within the next week. Until she gets them, she plans to isolate herself in her home, as she had been since Wednesday.
“I have a teenage granddaughter and I have family,” she said. “But I live alone, so I can self-isolate.”
