NIAGARA FALLS, N.Y. — The Niagara Falls Memorial Medical Center on Thursday will be administering free COVID-19 tests.
That event will run from 1 p.m. until 4 p.m. Thursday afternoon at Word of Life Ministries on Hyde Park Boulevard. The tests will be covered using City of Niagara Falls Community Development Block Grant funds.
The PCR test will be done quickly, according to the medical center, and no appointments will be needed.
If you have any questions, you can contact the medical center at (716) 278-4569 for information.
Earlier in the day, Niagara County announced that it is set to get the largest shipment to date of the COVID-19 vaccine.
The county's public health director, Dan Stapleton, said that the county will take a delivery next week of 6,500 first doses, the most ever in a single week so far during the coronavirus pandemic.
“As with everything regarding COVID-19, the situation can change in a minute and that happened last night when I was notified by New York State that we would be getting this huge shipment of vaccine, which is great news for our community,” Stapleton said.
He stresses however, that appointments will not be available until the vaccine is actually received.
“Hopefully, people who have been frustrated trying to get an appointment will find better success,” Stapleton said. “A shipment of this size is the first step to really building critical mass toward herd immunity, but we don’t know if this is just a one week occurrence or whether we can begin to expect significant shipments like this each week going forward.”