With Chicagoans clamoring for the exits of their government-imposed exiles, one key metric set by the city appears to still present a considerable challenge: the ability to test five percent of Chicago's residents each month.
That comes to roughly 135,000 Chicagoans, and breaks down to 4,500 tests each day. But NBC5 Investigates has crunched the numbers, and the city has hit that number only once, with 4,530 tests performed on April 30th.
In fact, since March 1s when Chicago Department of Public Health data show a single person was tested, only a total of 133,576 tests had been run in Chicago as of Friday. That's still far short of the 135,000 the mayor says must be performed before restrictions can be eased.
Still, appearing with actor Sean Penn at a testing event on Monday, the mayor expressed confidence her goal will be met.
"Our seven-day rolling average is up to 3,500 tests per day," the mayor told reporters. "All these sites will enable us to expand COVID-19 testing across Chicago from our previous level of approximately 3,000 tests per day, to well over our goal of 4,500 by the end of the month."
