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Should protesters get tested for COVID19?

Protesting in the midst of a pandemic could expose you to coronavirus.

COLUMBIA, S.C. — Although a lot has been going on in America over the last week, it's easy to forget the county is in the midst of a medical pandemic.

For many, protesting over the weekend and throughout the week is essential in advocating for change.

While protesters exercise their first amendment rights, they also have the potential to be exposed to COVID19.

“If you feel you have a need to be tested, you should by all means get tested," says Dr. Helmut Albrecht, chair of Internal Medicine at Prisma Health. He says the average time from exposure to onset of symptoms is 5.2 days, “You usually start shedding the virus and are highly infectious a day or two before that, ” he said. 

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Waiting for symptoms to show up before you get tested isn’t necessarily the safest thing to do.

Dr. Albrecht says if you think you were exposed you need to first assess your risk, “That risk is based on how close, how long was the contact, how intense was the contact, chanting, yelling – coughing sneezing has a higher risk than talking to somebody. If both of you wear masks, the risk of shedding droplets far away is very low.”

If you feel you were in a situation with high risk, there are multiple free testing sites across the Midlands.

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Prisma Health has free testing Thursday from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. at Riverbank Elementary, Friday at William J Clark Middle School, and Saturday the Sumter Civic Center.

Lexington Medical Center is hosting free testing to Cayce and West Columbia Residents June 16th at Brookland Baptist Church.

You can find more testing sites on DHEC's website here.

We asked what advice Dr. Albrecht would give to a protester and he recommends wearing a mask no matter what you are doing outside of your home.

If you have any story ideas or information on things happening around town, contact us at StreetSquad@wltx.com or tweet us using the hashtag #StreetSquad19.

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