DURHAM, N.H. — The University of New Hampshire is testing students for the coronavirus in a new lab on campus that uses self-swabbing home kits developed at the school.
UNH says the Durham lab can screen for COVID-19 on at least 4,000 samples a day. Test results can be generated in under 48 hours.
The testing procedure uses what is known as pooled testing where individual samples are combined and tested together to allow for faster results.
The test is a less invasive nose swab that students can perform, put in a test tube with a specially created barcoded label and drop off at a designated site on a specific day.
Students will be tested every four days during the semester.
If a positive result comes back the student is contacted by university and state health officials and will have a second test by a health-care provider.
If the second test is positive, the student will need to quarantine and contact tracing will begin.
Vermont on Monday started offering $30 to individuals to spend at local businesses to help residents and businesses hurt by the coronavirus pandemic.
The Legislature allocated $500,000 in federal coronavirus relief funds for the Buy Local Vermont program, and awards will be first come, first served. As of midday Tuesday, more than 10,000 Vermonters were trying to get signed up, and the website was having some trouble, said Commerce Secretary Lindsay Kurrle.
“The system is working, but I understand that the codes are a still little delayed, but we’re just asking for folks patience and hopefully those codes will be coming your way very shortly,” Kurrle said.
When the offer is activated, residents are matched with local businesses where they can use the funds.
Kinney Drugs is in partnership with the University of Vermont Medical Center to begin COVID-19 testing at 11 sites around Vermont, Health Commissioner Dr. Mark Levine announced Tuesday.
Some locations will start this week, and others will over the next two weeks, he said. Walgreens joined in a pilot testing effort a few months ago and now operates a drive-thru site in Essex Junction, he said.
Vermont to date has tested more than 146,000 people — nearly a quarter of the state’s population — through pop-up test sites operated by the Health Department and the Vermont National Guard and testing by hospitals and health care providers, Levine said.
The state created a new online system for registering for appointments and the reporting of test results. Test results will soon be available electronically through email for people who get tested at a Health Department site, speeding up the process, Levine said.
The traffic pattern on a main road near Hampton Beach is returning to what it was before the coronavirus pandemic hit, New Hampshire traffic officials said Tuesday.
Maintenance crews assisted the town of Hampton in removing the Ocean Boulevard northbound detour, returning Ashworth Avenue and Route 1A (Ocean Boulevard) to the pre-COVID-19, one-way traffic pattern, officials said.
A portion of the boulevard had been closed to traffic since May to create a wider walking mall to allow individuals to socially distance amid the coronavirus pandemic.
— Wire reports