In Large Texas Cities, Access To Coronavirus Testing May Depend On Where You Live

In Large Texas Cities, Access To Coronavirus Testing May Depend On Where You Live Enlarge this image toggle caption Dan Tian/Xinhua News Agency/Getty Images Dan Tian/Xinhua News Agency/Getty Images As COVID-19 continues to spread across the country, state and local health officials rush to try to detect and contain outbreaks before they get out of control. To determine where permanent testing sites were located, NPR contacted health care providers in those six largest cities in Texas — representing a total population of 7.9 million by most recent Census estimates — and reviewed government, health care and news websites. Sponsor Message NPR offered city and county health officials the opportunity to review the findings and point to additional testing sites. For cities that have testing disparities like these, the solution involves not just opening an equal number of testing sites in minority neighborhoods, but actually focusing on those that are most at risk, says Dr. William Owen, a medical school administrator whose work has focused on health care access for racial minorities. Sponsor Message Methodology NPR gathered addresses of permanent testing sites from county, city and state websites, health care providers and news reports.