The state of Florida is severing ties with Quest Diagnostics after the lab company failed to report nearly 75,000 COVID-19 test results in a timely manner, with some of them dating back to April.
Gov. Ron DeSantis called Quest’s data delay irresponsible, saying it has tainted the state’s daily test results for months.
But he doesn’t think dropping the large laboratory will have a negative impact on reporting going forward.
“You know, we've had more success with some of the more upstart labs in terms of their turnaround time. So I think that there's a lot a lot of options there. And I will tell you, we when we were having the biggest backlogs, the biggest backlogs were typically from Quest even back in in early July,” said DeSantis.
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DeSantis said Quest did contact everyone who tested positive to tell them their results.
New federal regulations on test-result reporting are expected to be finalized this week.
State public health officials hope the new rules will include penalties for those who fail to comply.
Contact reporter Cyd Hoskinson at choskinson@wjct.org, 904-358-6351 and on Twitter at @cydwjctnews.
