ADPH Expands COVID-19 Testing Criteria

May 11, 2020

The Alabama Department of Public Health has expanded its criteria for COVID-19 testing. The new testing criteria includes:

• Residents, both symptomatic and asymptomatic, of long-term care facilities where there is a laboratory-confirmed COVID-19 case in residents or staff.
• Hospitalized patients with symptoms.
• Health-care facility workers, workers in congregate living settings and first responders, with symptoms.
• Residents in long-term care facilities or other congregate living settings, including correctional and detention facilities and shelters, with symptoms.
• Persons without symptoms who have underlying medical conditions or disability placing them at a higher risk of complications.
• Residency in a congregate housing setting such as a homeless shelter or long-term care facility.
• Screening of other asymptomatic individuals based on a case-by-case review and approval by the state or local health department.

Widening the conditions to test high-risk people before symptoms appear can lower the risk of transmitting the virus and allow contact tracing to begin earlier, the ADPH said. The added criteria were recommended by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Symptoms of COVID-19 consist of either cough or shortness of breath (difficulty breathing) or at least two of the following: fever, chills, repeated shaking with chills, muscle pain, headache, vomiting, diarrhea, sore throat and new loss of taste or smell.