A 2-Day COVID-19 Testing Site to Open in East Palo Alto

A coronavirus testing site will open for two days next week in
East Palo Alto, city officials said today.

The site will be open from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Friday May 21 and Saturday May 22 at the Lewis and Joan Platt East Palo Alto Family YMCA at 550 Bell St. in East Palo Alto.

Testing is free and available to everyone regardless of immigration status. Tests are also available to everyone regardless of medical condition. Appointments are required and can be made at the Project Baseline website.

Residents can drive or walk up to the testing site, but they must
go up to the site alone, city officials said. Multilingual staff members will be on hand.

Mayor Regina Wallace-Jones said she decided to advocate for a site
in East Palo Alto because communities of color are disproportionately involved in service and essential worker occupations. Therefore they are disproportionately at risk of being exposed to the coronavirus.

She said East Palo Alto has a substantial undocumented community
and 12 percent of residents are uninsured.

Also, for some residents, getting to a testing site 14 miles away
in another part of San Mateo County may be challenging and language barriers might exist, Wallace-Jones said.

— Bay City News