Dublin Airport has said that it will open two COVID-19 testing facilities at the airport this Thursday.
The testing facilities, which will be operated by healthcare firms Randox and RocDoc, will offer passengers and consumers the option of either a drive-through test or a walk-in test. The testing facilities are fully open to the public, whether they require a test for travel or for another reason. Both PCR and LAMP testing will be available. Prices, which are set by the providers of the service, will start at EUR99.
‘We have been keen to provide testing at Dublin Airport for some time and the Government’s recent decision to grant planning exemption, which we strongly welcome, will enable two testing facilities to open this Thursday,’ said Dublin Airport managing director, Vincent Harrison.
The move comes as there is a demand for travel-related COVID testing, as several countries now require arriving passengers to have had a negative COVID test result prior to travel. Testing is also one of the elements of the new European Union/European Economic Area traffic light system for travel, which has been adopted by Ireland and other European countries.
Customers will need to pre-book their test online in advance and this can be done directly with the respective healthcare company. Links to the booking portals will also be available on the Dublin Airport website. The healthcare providers that are working with Dublin Airport have testing capacity of more than 12,000 tests per day if needed, and this will be expanded to 15,000 soon, the Airport said.
‘We have significant capacity in place to implement high volume PCR testing, which is currently the only method of COVID-19 testing recognised and approved by every country worldwide,’ said Sophie Boyd, project manager for Randox’s testing service at Dublin Airport.
RocDoc chief executive, David Rock, said the company had been working with Dublin Airport for more than two months in relation to the new facility. ‘We will be installing a category two laboratory and testing facility, which will be able to process over and above the expected tests per day,’ Rock added.
Randox’s walk-through facility will be located in an existing building close to the Terminal 2 multi-storey car park and will have separate entry and exit points for customers. RocDoc’s drive-through facility will be located in the Express Green car park, which is accessed via the R132 (Old Airport Road). Both facilities will be clearly signposted.
The Irish Government has set the State’s rules in relation to COVID-19 and travel since the pandemic struck. Last week, the Government adopted the EU traffic light system on travel, within which specific regions are independently designated as Green, Orange or Red by the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (EDCD) depending on the level of cases in those areas.
