Katie Aguas winced as a health care worker gently poked the swab up her nose. But she wants a test for COVID-19. She’s got no symptoms, but it’s a different and tragic story for her family in Bergenfield. More than 740 of the city’s residents have tested positive for the virus.
“So I wanted a test for my peace of mind and for my family’s peace of mind, for sure. Because my dad actually passed away during this time and it’s been very, very difficult for our family,” she said. “The whole scary thing is, you can be asymptomatic, as well.”
Bergenfield’s the first town to offer testing for asymptomatic residents in a county where COVID-19 burned so hot it comprised 1.5% of all cases nationwide — more than 16,000. But that only counts cases of people visibly sick with symptoms of the virus and residents demanded tests for everyone.
“We are a hard-hit community. We have a lot of cases here in Bergenfield and we believe the people in the people in the community deserve to know whether they carry the virus or not,” said Mayor Arvin Amatorio.
“They say we need to be tested because it’s the only way that we know and the rest of the world knows that they are asymptomatic and don’t spread the virus,” said Councilman Hernando Rivera.
Testing everyone also gives officials a wider scope to make decisions, like when to reopen, experts say.
“You’re looking for hot spots. You’re looking for trends. You’re trying to understand where are we in this outbreak,” said Dr. Martin Blaser, director of the Center for Advance Biotechnology and Medicine at Rutgers University. “Right now everybody’s blind. They don’t really know whose got it, or not. This provides us some tools.”
Jersey City and Hoboken also offer testing to residents with no symptoms. Officials in Bergenfield say the county will soon deploy a mobile testing van.
“I just figure everyone in New Jersey should get tested. I don’t really see a reason why not,” said Bergenfield resident Alison Ferstendig.
But tests are expensive and hard to come by, so Bergenfield teamed up with private lab siParadigm. Residents can register online for appointments. The borough can do more than 300 tests a day, and already 800 people have signed up. Additionally, Bergenfield’s doing contact tracing of people who have tested positive.
“Eighty percent, maybe 85%, have received phone calls from the health department and have been asked a number of questions regarding who they’ve been in contact with, relations, who else they could have infected,” said Corey Callo, Bergenfield borough administrator.
The borough’s cautious. With 26,700 residents crammed into 2.8 square miles, Bergenfield kept municipal parks closed this weekend despite a statewide opening of state and county parks. Officials in Bergenfield want to see a steady decline in the curve before opening up.
“I think this is a great way for us to try to figure out how this is going to end sooner than later,” said Aguas.
