NASSAU, BAHAMAS — Doctors Hospital has completed more than one million COVID-19 tests since the onset of the pandemic, according to Doctors Hospitals Chief Financial Officer Dennis Deveaux, who said the testing program has been profitable but made affordable to Bahamians.
The hospital has the capacity, through its numerous testing sites, to administer over 100,000 tests per month.
These include both RT-PCR tests and rapid antigen tests.
The hospital completed its one-millionth test last week.
“The overwhelming majority of that is in support of tourism-related fields in large resorts and hotels, but for people [who] are obviously seeking to travel and get back to the kind of ordinary mode of operating and doing business,” Deveaux said.
“We have been happy to project that capacity and also to do so, you know — it’s somewhat of a commercial point — but at a price point that the average Bahamian could afford.
“If you look around the world frankly, you’d be hard-pressed to find the capacity, the throughout, the quality of COVID-19 testing at the price point that we’ve been able to deliver in it The Bahamas.
Deveaux recalled spending $100 on a rapid antigen test to return to The Bahamas from the United States prior to the country’s change in its travel regime.
He said early on in the pandemic, Doctors Hospital recognized the private sector would have to play a significant role in ensuring Bahamians could receive high-quality COVID testing and an affordable rate.
Asked how Doctors Hospital has been able to maintain its prices, Deveaux said a decision was made that the price point was not going to be the reason why someone could not get a test at Doctors Hospital.
“Price is a decision and cost is your problem then to manage based on the decision you made,” he told Eyewitness News.
“Our president and CEO Dr Charles Diggis made it very, very clear that we would provide high quality and affordable COVID-19 testing as scale. We took those marching orders and we’ve figured out how to make it work.
“That’s beyond the cost of the test itself. We obviously have employed in the delivery of this critical service over 250 people that right now are spread across, not only New Providence, but we have in excess of 10 testing sites on Grand Bahama and Exuma.”
Deveaux was also asked how much has testing contributed to Doctors Hospital’s revenue stream.
He said the testing program has been profitable, which is a good thing, especially when the institution has managed to have market-leading prices and high-quality tests.
He said: “We have generated a robust revenue stream and we have, even at the affordable price points, we have returned profits to shareholders. Obviously, because we are a publicly listed company I am not able to speak specifically to the quantum of our revenue.”
As of Monday, The Bahamas had performed over 215,000 RT-PCR tests.
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