Plans to relocate Garran Surge Centre under consideration

ACT Health Minister Rachel Stephen-Smith has reassured Canberrans the centre will be dismantled and moved from the Garran Oval but it would continue to be used as a testing site in the lead-up to Christmas.

The centre itself could be relocated, Ms Stephen-Smith saying discussions were under way with other agencies who may be interested in using the facility.

A decision on the future of the site could be made in the coming weeks, with the government to explore all options for the pop-up centre.

"The questions we're asking is that when it's dismantled, we know it was designed to be dismantled piece-by-piece and re-erected somewhere else, so we're just working through the options as to whether there is somebody who might want to do that. Otherwise, whether it might go into storage," Ms Stephen-Smith said.

The $14 million centre was opened in May 2020 as a pop-up emergency department designed to treat COVID-19 patients. It was built in just 37 days. But the centre has never been used for its intended purpose.

The centre has been used as a COVID-19 testing site and a vaccination hub. The centre has also been used this year as a walk-in centre for COVID patients.

It is now the last ACT government-run testing site after the drive-through COVID testing centre in Mitchell closed on Friday.

The Mitchell centre, which opened in December 2021 following the closure of the testing site at Exhibition Park, delivered 78,000 PCR tests.

The decision to close the centre came after a significant reduction in demand for PCR testing.

Ms Stephen-Smith said the future of PCR testing would also be considered as the 50-50 funding arrangement with the Commonwealth comes to an end.

She said the cost of the COVID response needed to be considered.

"We do need to continue to think about the cost of our response to COVID-19. It does sit outside the general health budget so the reduction in costs won't go back into the health system," she said.

Over recent months there was an average of about 400 tests per day, down from about 2500 over the peak of winter.

The Mitchell centre was run by the ACT government but staffed by Capital Pathology.

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Capital Pathology collection coordinator Kathy Burdett said the closure of the site would allow the organisation to move back to more normal operations.

"It felt like our world was nothing but COVID for the last year or so," she said.

"As far as winding down goes, we'll cease operation here. I believe that the entire structure will be gone by the middle of next week. The team will completely dismantle that."

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