LOUISVILLE, Ky. — The demand for COVID-19 testing is rising in the Commonwealth. Take Louisville for example — sites are booking up, sometimes one week or more in advance. At sites that do not require an appointment, long lines are commonplace. Metro Health said testing is "ramping up" to meet the demand during this current surge of new cases.

Louisville's Chief Health Strategist Dr. Sarah Moyer touched the supply of testing materials Thursday, saying, "because of the increase of COVID burden on our community, testing is starting to be in shorter than it was just a day or two ago.”

Results can take several days to come back, so Moyer said patience and isolation are required.

Kentucky is grappling with record-breaking case numbers — on Thursday, Governor Andy Beshear reported the highest single-day number of new cases: 3,649. Testing demand reflects that.

“We were expecting it with the increase in cases," Moyer said. "There’s increase in contacts and people that get exposed and plus we’re recommending testing now too if anybody is not able to stay at home with the governor’s new recommendations.”

At UofL Health, there's almost four times the number of people requesting tests than there were about a month ago. There are also more people testing positive. 

“The concern is that two and three weeks from now if we’ve got people in the hospital, it could severely impact the care that we can deliver if we can’t stem that tide," said Chief Medical Officer Dr. Jason Smith. 

Smith encouraged even more people to be tested, for anyone with symptoms to be screened for the virus. He and Dr. Moyer also urge people to stay home for at least the next three weeks — that means no Thanksgiving travel.  

“It feels like we’re stumbling here at the end of the race. And we need to pick our feet back up and continue on this path that we have been on to keep everybody safe,” he says. 

UofL Health says 10,063 tests were performed in October, which is up from 6,639 in September. They're on track to do even more in November.