{"id":33381,"date":"2020-10-09T13:09:25","date_gmt":"2020-10-09T18:09:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/?p=33381"},"modified":"2021-06-11T14:44:19","modified_gmt":"2021-06-11T19:44:19","slug":"oklahoma-is-finally-getting-a-new-public-health-lab","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/2020\/10\/09\/oklahoma-is-finally-getting-a-new-public-health-lab\/","title":{"rendered":"Oklahoma Is Finally Getting A New Public Health Lab"},"content":{"rendered":"<div style=\"width: 100%; height: 170px; margin-bottom: 20px; border-radius: 10px; overflow:hidden;\"><iframe style=\"width: 100%; height: 170px;\" frameborder=\"no\" scrolling=\"no\" seamless src=\"https:\/\/player.captivate.fm\/episode\/2a1362b5-0677-4a88-9c63-98daea5c5c92\"><\/iframe><\/div><p>During a press conference about a new pandemic response initiative, Gov. kevin Stitt announced his administration\u2019s plan to move the state\u2019s public health lab to Stillwater. The lab has several functions, the most visible of which has been processing coronavirus tests. In normal times, it processes several kinds of specimens, including disease screenings for all of Oklahoma\u2019s newborns.<\/p><p>Like much of Oklahoma\u2019s public health infrastructure, the Public Health Laboratory is in disrepair, and it has been for years. At one point, it was in danger of <a href=\"https:\/\/urldefense.proofpoint.com\/v2\/url?u=https-3A__oklahoman.com_article_5548470_oklahoma-2Dlawmakers-2Dadvance-2Dbond-2Dfor-2Dnew-2Dstate-2Dhealth-2Dlab&d=DwMFaQ&c=qKdtBuuu6dQK9MsRUVJ2DPXW6oayO8fu4TfEHS8sGNk&r=RBzu2LBfPhHRGTQ6nE27NjuPsyWD3UxRM5C-SoxU3Ec&m=W4x84eaYK4_cm0PwfSIuoz8NfMyTASSJJdHWpZ8eWp0&s=RBf8uWO9lmVGoZ64hxR7UdGxOqWuEg57mRTq2xMBEiI&e=\">losing its accreditation from the College of American Pathologists<\/a>, which would force it to close immediately.<\/p><p>The Legislature authorized more than $50 million in bonds to replace the lab a few years ago, and Stitt said the state would also use some federal coronavirus relief funding for it.<\/p><p>The announcement the lab would be in Stillwater came as a surprise. No past plans have involved moving the lab and its workforce away from the state department of health\u2019s headquarters or the biomedical hub in Oklahoma City. The Stitt administration said the move would strengthen the state\u2019s rural health capacity.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>During a press conference about a new pandemic response initiative, Gov. kevin Stitt announced his administration\u2019s plan to move the state\u2019s public health lab to Stillwater. The lab has several functions, the most visible of which has been processing coronavirus tests. In normal times, it processes several kinds of specimens, including disease screenings for all [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":213,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33381"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/213"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=33381"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33381\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":34111,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33381\/revisions\/34111"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=33381"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=33381"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=33381"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}