Lilly Seeing ‘Phenomenally Positive’ Response to Drive-Thru Testing
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As a subscriber you can listen to articles at work, in the car, or while you work out. Subscribe NowThe chief scientific officer of Indianapolis-based Eli Lilly and Co. (NYSE: LLY) says the response to the company’s testing of healthcare workers and first responders for COVID-19 has been phenomenal. Dr. Daniel Skovronsky says he believes the company is making a big difference in the city by filling an unmet need. “We’ve heard stories from so many doctors and nurses and other healthcare workers working at the front lines of COVID-19 who are worried that they’ve been exposed, that they’re sick, having symptoms and are unable to get testing.”
Skovronsky discussed the effort in an interview with Inside INdiana Business on Tuesday.
“We just been running a short time and people are still streaming through, of course,” said Skovronsky. “We’ve already sampled more than 500 healthcare workers for testing and the numbers continue to grow every hour. We have been able to meet the demand so far. We have call-in numbers set up and we schedule appointments generally in the same day that people call in and when they get here, it flows pretty quickly.”
The program began on Monday for healthcare workers in Indianapolis and was shortly thereafter expanded to serve first responders in the city. Skovronsky says the capacity that Lilly has can still expand if needed and they have not yet had to turn anyone away from receiving a test.
“Our goal is to help patients and the best way we can do that is by helping the people that take care of patients and the people that keep us all safe, which (are) first responders. But our other goal, which I think is even just critically important, is to stop the spread of COVID-19 in the community. There is still community spread; we need people to stay at home, to isolate themselves from one another and we need to identify the people who have COVID-19, so they can take extra precautions.”
You can hear more about Lilly’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic from Skovronsky on this weekend’s edition of Inside INdiana Business with Gerry Dick.
Skovronsky says he believes the company is making a big difference in the city by filling an unmet need.