A one-stop shop for Coronavirus testing has been set-up in a shipping container in the Northland town of Kaitaia.
Northland doctor Lance O'Sullivan has been working on the mobile clinic for weeks and says it is now part of a compound where six of his staff will also live onsite so as not to risk passing Covid-19 onto their families.
The clinic opens on Wednesday and he says they are there for the long haul - likely two to three months.
"We've got a compound here in Kaitaia… [the clinic] is a 40-foot shipping container we've converted into a medical clinic," Dr O'Sullivan told Checkpoint.
"We have a whole lot of campervans where our staff are staying.
"We've got wardens here who will help people be triaged, so they'll figure out where they need to go.
"They'll go to a place where they'll be rapidly assessed by a clinical med team and they'll determine whether they need to be tested for Covid or not."
Dr O'Sullivan said he is anticipating about 15 percent of people who turn up will need the nasopharyngeal swab test.
They will also be assessing and treating people with other medical issues.
"People are still going to have heart attacks, people are still going to have meningitis, kids are still going to have ear infections.
"So we are also assessing for that. And if they need treatment we're right next to a pharmacy," Dr O'Sullivan said.
"If they need to be hospitalised we've got protocols for that."
He said he thinks they will be busy as there is a lot of anxiety in the community, and there are many general health issues, as people are not getting medical attention because of the lockdown.
"The biggest issue we're have over time I believe is we'll be missing all these things because of our attention on coronavirus. It's not that it's not important, but there are other things that are being missed and it's a massive concern."
