Gov. Charlie Baker is starting a “coronavirus command center” to battle the spread of the novel virus in the Bay State.
The command center will focus on expanding lab capacity for and distribution of testing, planning quarantine operations and overseeing allocation of personal protective equipment and looking at hospital crisis capacity.
“This team of experts will focus solely on pushing back against this disease and moving quickly to respond to the needs of our communities and residents,” Baker said.
The command center will be led by Health and Human Services Secretary Marylou Sudders. She will hand over her day-to-day duties.
The state is also issuing new guidance that will allow more people to be tested. Clinicians will no longer have to receive testing approval from the state lab before submitting specimens for patients that meet certain criteria. Clinicians can now also send just a single swab instead of two to speed up testing capacity at the state lab, Sudders said.
“This change will allow us to test more individuals in a day,” Baker said, adding that an additional lab coming online “will dramatically increase our ability to test and that’s a really good thing.”
Massachusetts officials had reported 123 cases of the novel coronavirus in the state as of Friday afternoon, with 18 confirmed and 105 “presumptive positive.” Of the cases, 94 are linked to last month’s Biogen conference. Overall, 475 patients have been tested for the virus.