Most PCR test sites in the Hunter are set to close on Friday, as the COVID-19 pandemic transitions away from emergency status and the "armageddon" of the summer of 2021-22 fades into memory.
The closures follow the World Health Organisation declaring at the weekend that COVID no longer represents a "global health emergency".
Newcastle company Medtech Services ran 15 drive-through PCR test sites in the Hunter with 4CytePathology at the height of the pandemic.
Medtech's director Nick Burns said the sites began winding down last October, as demand for COVID tests fell.
Of Medtech's remaining test sites at Wallsend, Warners Bay and Morisset, two will close on Friday.
"Warners Bay started in late July 2020. It was the first private PCR test site in NSW, outside of the Bondi one in Sydney," Mr Burns said.
He said the Wallsend site will remain open as a drive-through PCR test site for patients with a doctor's referral.
"That will at least give people somewhere to go. There will be an ongoing need for testing for people who can't walk into a regular pathology room," he said.
"A lot of pathology rooms are co-located at doctors' surgeries, which have their own rules about whether they let people in with symptoms.
"Surgeries don't really want symptomatic patients sitting in their waiting rooms."
Demand for PCR testing peaked in December 2021/January 2022, with massive lines of vehicles waiting for tests - a time Mr Burns described as "armageddon".
"There's still enough demand to have the service running in the hundreds per day, but not the thousands," he said.
The latest NSW Respiratory Surveillance Report for the week ending April 29 said there were 534 positive PCR tests in the Hunter-New England district and 771 positive RAT tests.
Three PCR test sites also remain at Wickham, Telarah and Raymond Terrace through Histopath.
The Newcastle Herald contacted Histopath to confirm if those sites will close as expected on Friday, in line with the NSW government's timeline, but the company made no comment.
NSW Health Minister Ryan Park said last month "a significant reduction in demand for PCR testing" occurred since January, "driven by changes in health recommendations, testing behaviour and increased access to rapid antigen tests (RATs)".
Mr Burns said RAT tests may not result in a positive test for "some days from when you're first symptomatic".
The Therapeutic Goods Administration [TGA] said last month that it had reviewed all COVID tests to verify whether they could "accurately detect emerging genetic variants".
"Laboratory and health professionals should be aware that genetic variants of SARS-CoV-2 may yield false negative test results," it stated.
The TGA added that nucleic acid tests [which includes PCR tests] that use "multiple genetic targets to determine a final result are less likely to be impacted by increased prevalence of genetic variants".
Mr Burns said the PCR test remains the "gold standard for COVID testing".
NSW chief health officer Dr Kerry Chant said last month that PCR testing, requested by a medical or nurse practitioner, will "continue to be available at private pathology services with a referral form".
The federal Department of Health said referrals from GPs or nurses for a PCR test at a pathology clinic will be bulk billed.
"To access these tests, patients must be eligible for Medicare and obtain a request indicating that a medical or nurse practitioner has determined the test is necessary for the clinical management of their patient," the department said.
Professor Nathan Bartlett, a University of Newcastle virologist, said "it's still important to know if you've got COVID".
Professor Bartlett said "knowing how immune you are is necessary" when deciding whether to get a booster shot.
The World Health Organisation said COVID's death rate had plummeted from a peak of more than 100,000 people a week in January 2021 to about 3500 a week in late April.
In announcing the end of the global emergency, WHO director-general Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said about seven million COVID deaths had been reported, but the true death toll was at least 20 million.
Professor Bartlett said "the threat hasn't disappeared".
"The WHO has made a call that it's not as threatening as it was and that's fair enough," he said.
"We have vaccines and a pretty good level of immunity around a lot of the world."
But he said this "shouldn't change how seriously we take COVID-19".
"It remains a huge burden on healthcare and people's lives," he said.
"There is still an increased level of vigilance required and an ongoing and concerted effort in research to better understand this virus and come up with new treatments.
"As this virus continues to evolve, we know it will continue to evade our treatments."
He said the vaccines had been "unable to stop this virus from efficiently transmitting".
"They certainly protect us from severe disease, but they're not stopping the virus from circulating and affecting lots of people."
This increases the risk of "a virus emerging that is a lot more nasty and could cause a spike in deaths".
He said more research is needed into vaccines and other approaches that "stop the virus infecting us and prevent it from transmitting so easily".
"This is a highly infectious virus, one of the most infectious human viruses that's ever entered the human population. For every one person infected, it can infect up to 10 people. It's way more infectious than the flu."
