Testing site at Orange County Convention Center to stay open, state will fund and ramp up testing

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TALLAHASSEE, Fla. - Governor Ron DeSantis announced in a news conference on Thursday that the testing site at the Orange County Convention Center will stay open.

He said that the testing site is federally-funded and because of this, tests were limited to just 250 a day because of their contract with LabCorp and Quest. Those tests are expected to run out tomorrow. The state of Florida will take over this testing site and supply it with more tests.

The Governor said that he is hoping to do much more than 250 tests a day, as the current state-run testing sites run through about 700 to 800 tests a day.

MORE NEWS: Over 16,300 cases of coronavirus in Florida, death toll jumps to 354, Florida Department of Health says

In addition, Governor DeSantis thinks it is important to get tests and data done on asymptomatic carriers of COVID-19. Florida is currently working on getting antibodies tests to do so.

Florida Emergency Management is sending out two million emergency masks, 350,000 face shields, 500,000 shoe covers, 350,000 gloves, and hand sanitizer to frontline health care workers today.