COVID-19 patients can get positive status certified with supervised ART at Quick Test Centres

COVID-19 patients can now take a supervised self-administered Antigen Rapid Test (ART) at Quick Test Centres (QTC) and have their infection record updated on HealthHub within 30 minutes. 

The supervised ARTs will be fully funded by the government from Feb 16 to Mar 15, Minister of Health Ong Ye Kung announced in Parliament on Tuesday (Feb 15). 

This is to reduce the pressure general practitioner (GP) clinics and polyclinics face, allowing patients with serious symptoms to receive more medical attention. 

GP clinics, polyclinics and hospitals have seen a rise in patients coming in to get an ART conducted by a medical professional and to have their infection documented under the Ministry of Health’s (MOH) records. 

MOH has also raised their concerns that some patients with no or mild symptoms are still visiting hospitals’ emergency departments. Those with non-serious symptoms should avoid doing so as this might risk compromising the standard of care for those in need. 

The QTCs however will not issue any medical certificates or recovery memos as these are not required by employees or students to return to work or school, MOH said. 

By the end of this week, there will be about 205 of these centres. The full list of the centres’ locations can be found here. 

If an individual is tested positive, they will recover under Protocol 2, where they have to self-isolate at home for at least three days. They can exit isolation and resume normal activities once their self-administered ART is negative. 

Infected individuals can also collect free ART kits from vending machines. 

Bookings for supervised self-administered ART at the centres can be made here.