On Mar. 23, 2020, LabCorp announced that it was exploring all options to prioritize COVID-19 testing for the hospital inpatient population who are being treated for what the physician suspects may be the COVID-19 virus. The company anticipated finalizing options through the week and  subsequently planned to work with hospitals to begin implementation. LabCorp was performing COVID-19 testing in three of its largest labs in the country.

LabCorp was also preparing to help hospitals for whom it provides technical support services to perform on-site serological and molecular tests for COVID-19, including Cepheid’s recently announced Xpert Xpress SARS-CoV-2 molecular test, once available. LabCorp remained in close contact with manufacturers that are developing additional test options, and will work with healthcare providers to help them prepare to use these tests when they become available.

LabCorp continued to play a vital role in supporting the public response to COVID-19 and has moved quickly to increase its testing capacity by adding staff, equipment and more high-throughput testing. On Friday, March 20, LabCorp announced that it had the ability to perform more than 20,000 COVID-19 tests per day. This represents a significant increase in capacity since the company released its COVID-19 test on March 5, 2020. The company was working continuously to support the needs of healthcare workers, patients, government, clients and other organizations, and expects capacity to continue to increase.