FORD LAUNCHES DRUG STORE COVID TESTS ONLY IN HUNTSVILLE
Mark Clairmont | MuskokaTODAY.com
HUNTSVILLE — Long line-ups for COVID tests could get shorter as the province partners with pharmacies to provide free testing starting Friday.
At the Shopper’s Drug Mart in Huntsville today, Premier Doug Ford said Ontario will begin offering testing by appointment only, at 60 pharmacies with further locations coming online in the coming weeks.
Huntsville is the only Shopper’s in Muskoka so far.
And a quick call around Wednesday to Rexall pharmacies in Gravenhurst and Bracebridge and neither pharmacy is aware of the test coming later this week.
He was joined by Health Minister Christine Elliott, Jeff Leger, president and CEO of Shopper’s Drug Mart, Huntsville Mayor Karin Terziano, MP Scott Aichison and MPP Norm Miller and Muskoka Algonquin Healthcare CEO Natalie Bubela.
They say it will expand testing capacity well beyond the province’s 150 assessment centres – including two in Muskoka – and complement pop-up drive-through testing centres also in Muskoka.
Ford said it will put a “dent” in line-ups, but the “frustrated premier” also called on the federal government to allow saliva testing that he says would be a “game-changer.”
He said “nothing in this country is more important than these tests.”
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