"I ended up going to a different laboratory on day five, and I got that test result before I got Laverty's, which came on day six." Read more about the vaccine rollout: "It was taking a toll by day three of not leaving the house. "I definitely started to feel some severe cabin fever within those four walls," he said. Texts viewed by ABC News show it ended up taking almost a week, during which time Mr Juel had no option but to self-isolate at home. Mr Juel expected his test through Laverty's Bondi Junction testing site to take several days at most. Tyler Juel got tested for COVID-19 last month after playing tennis in the courts at a Sydney apartment complex that was then identified as a potential exposure site. Sydney resident Tyler Juel waited six days in isolation at home for a COVID pathology test by Laverty. However, Laverty has been criticised at times for its testing delays. "The test wouldn't be viable at where the fee was previously."Īs well as pop-up clinics, Dr Parmenter said the company had been doing COVID-19 screening for a range of contracts, such as for people travelling overseas, for politicians at Parliament House, and even for the AFL.
"At that time, the consumables and the cost of collection would have been significantly higher than the fee being paid for the test," he said. UPDATES: Read our round-up of the latest news on the COVID-19 pandemic Pathology company boss defends Medicare hikeĭr Parmenter said the boost to the Medicare rebate was needed because the existing rebate for virus screening was too low when the pandemic first hit Australia. The total cost of that has not been revealed. The rest of the tests were funded on an equal cost share basis by the Australian government and the states and territories under the national partnership on COVID-19 response.
That includes tests provided by both public and private, it added.
The federal government told ABC News that as of August 27 it had subsidised over 12 million COVID-19 pathology tests through Medicare at a cost of more than $993 million. Public pathology labs got a smaller rise to $50 with a $42.50 rebate. The industry got a boost very early on in the pandemic when the federal government raised the Medicare rebate on COVID-19 tests from $28.65 to $100 with an $85 rebate for private providers. "We're obviously having a pretty strong period," Healius chief executive Malcolm Parmenter told ABC News. More than 30 million COVID tests have now been screened by pathology labs in Australia.