SINGAPORE – People waiting for Covid-19 swab test results may experience delays beyond 24 hours because laboratories are experiencing a surge in the number of swabs being sent in daily, said Parkway Laboratories chief executive Daniel Tan.

He said the daily average number of swabs received in the past two weeks was almost double that from a month ago. He did not reveal the figures as they were deemed to be sensitive.

Dr Tan said the machines processing the swabs were fully utilised and lab technicians had been working 16 to 18 hours daily since two weeks ago, with some even volunteering to return on their days off.

He said: “This has been the busiest I’ve been since I joined in 2017. It’s even busier than the first wave last year as we did not have as much testing capacity then.”

Parkway Laboratories, which comes under  IHH Healthcare Singapore, currently processes swab tests for more than 200 general practitioner clinics, four IHH Healthcare hospitals, some nursing homes, prisons and migrant worker dormitories.

The surge in testing comes as Singapore moves aggressively to curb community transmissions of Covid-19 with mass testing and swabbing taking place at many places, including at Swab and Send Home (Sash) clinics.