Lab Matters Summer 2022 | Page 7

FEATURE

About a week before the first COVID-19 positive case was identified in Minnesota in March 2020 , Myra Kunas , MS , was sitting in a conference room with about 12 other people trying to budget for the testing that was about to hit her laboratory division . No one was wearing masks or social distancing yet , as the team huddled over their laptops and brainstormed on how many samples the laboratory might receive .

Kunas was assistant laboratory director of the Minnesota Public Health Laboratory Division at the time , but she would be promoted to director two months into the pandemic , after her director retired .

“ So , we were up there discussing budgets , and we estimated we would have to test for a month , 300 samples per week , and then 200 after that , and then 100 probably for another six months . And then that ’ s it ,” Kunas said . “ And we got 1,000 in one day about one week after our first positive case .”

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Summer ¡ w 2022 LAB MATTERS 5