Detroit mayor says essential workers will be tested for the coronavirus regardless of symptoms

Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan said Friday that the city will offer covid-19 tests to employees in the city who work at essential businesses like grocery stores and banks.

According to the Detroit Free Press, Duggan wants to be the first city in the United States to ensure that key members of the workforce are healthy during the pandemic.

Detroit will start offering the tests Monday.

“I just wanted to try to be the first city in America that can say to the companies: ‘You have to be open, your employees have to be there. We’re going to do everything we can to make sure the employees coming to work are not at risk,’” Duggan said.

Duggan said the city would “prioritize businesses like restaurants and food-handling centers — places where it can spread.”

Workers can get tested at the city’s drive-thru testing site, regardless of whether they are symptomatic of covid-19, the Free Press reported.

As of 3 p.m. Friday, Michigan officials said Detroit had 582 coronavirus deaths, with 34 dying on the day before.

Duggan has remained optimistic that the city’s measures are flattening the curve of the virus in the city, the newspaper reported.

“In the City of Detroit, we are beating this thing,” the mayor said. “The number of people who are going in to doctors and hospitals [is] dropping every day.”