AUGUSTA, Maine — Gov. Janet Mills' administration announced Wednesday that pooled testing for COVID-19 in Maine schools will end in May.
In a release, Mills' office said the change is due to the pooled testing's "reduced effectiveness in limiting the spread of the highly contagious BA.2 variant and the widespread availability of free and convenient at-home tests for students and school staff."
In this new phase of the pandemic, with the BA.2 variant, frequent use of over-the-counter rapid antigen tests has become a more effective way to protect the health of school communities, Mills' office said.
The final week for Maine schools to conduct pooled testing will be May 9-13, with the last set of results reported to schools by May 15.
The Maine Department of Education and Department of Health and Human Services announced recently that the state will make 1.1 million at-home test kits available to all K-12 schools in the state. According to the governor's office, this is enough for schools to supply every school student and staff member in the state with a free rapid antigen test kit containing five to six tests.
According to state health officials, as the COVID-19 virus changes, so must Maine’s testing strategy.
“Pooled testing successfully protected the health of our school communities during earlier stages of the pandemic, and frequent use of free and convenient at-home tests will continue to protect students and staff as we confront the BA.2 variant. We thank Maine schools for partnering with us in this important effort," Maine Center for Disease Control and Prevention Director Dr. Nirav Shah and Maine DHHS Commissioner Jeanne Lambrew said in Wednesday's release.
"By providing schools and families with access to free tests, we can continue to ensure the health and safety of students and school staff," added Maine DOE Commissioner Pender Makin.
Between the pooled testing program’s launch in May 2021 and April 1, 2022, 488 schools across Maine have tested 128,990 pools, with 11,679 pools identifying positive individuals, according to the governor's office. State health officials said that the positivity rate has averaged 9.1 percent, reaching as high as 28 percent in January 2022.
