“Jen Flory, a policy advocate at the Western Center on Law and Poverty, said she welcomed the administration’s intent to hold health plans accountable for covering COVID-19 testing and to expand testing in vulnerable communities. She said it’s important that the state ensure testing is available, in particular, to low-wage and essential workers, people with limited English proficiency and the uninsured.

But the state must still provide flexible testing options like the state’s drive-thru testing sites for Californians, even as it pushes to make more testing available in traditional medical settings, she said.

“There needs to be a way for people to get testing outside of traditional 9-5 doctors offices,” she said.”

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