LCBOs run out of free rapid tests in less than a day

All COVID-19 rapid tests that were designated to be handed out at LCBOs starting on Friday have been given out.

The use of LCBOs was announced Wednesday by the provincial government as a part of their holiday testing blitz.

Several LCBO locations were listed on their government agency’s website on Thursday evening with the expectation the tests would be available right away.

Hundreds of people waited in line outside LCBO retailers on Friday morning, but were told once by employees that the stores had not received any COVID-19 rapid tests.

CityNews viewers say they waited in lines of up to 100 people for an hour before finding out there were no tests available.

“We don’t have them and we have no idea when we are getting them. I’ve called a couple other locations nearby and they have the same news,” said one woman in line at the LCBO near Highway 401 and Weston Road.

The same statement was being shared to customers at the Yonge Street and Summerhill Avenue location and Keele Street and Lawrence Avenue, according to multiple reports.

Toronto resident Barrie Rosenthal told CityNews the free rapid tests are a “fantastic idea.”

He went to get his rapid test at an LCBO in the Danforth and Victoria Park area, however, after standing in the long line-up he was told by an LCBO staff member the tests were not available yet and they had no idea when they would be delivered.

“That’s kind of frustrating and it’s also kind of unfortunately rather typical of what happens when the government gets around to something after the fact — I mean way after the fact. So, it’s annoying. It’s frustrating and it doesn’t give us a good hope when we’re trying to do the right thing,” Rosenthal added.

The NDP’s Marit Stiles is calling the free rapid tests available at some LCBO locations “a start” and said she’s happy to see these kits going home with families, but adds “it shouldn’t have to be a race like the Hunger Games to get a rapid test in this province — that’s outrageous.”

“What the government has done by throwing them [the tests] out there, without even, it seems, training up and informing the employees who are supposed to be distributing those in the LCBO stores so they could be ready,” Stiles said, “they are creating a bit of a ‘squid game’ now for access to rapid tests and it didn’t need to be this way.”

Stiles is also questioning why some regions in the province are not seeing rapid tests yet after the federal government provided around $2-billion in funding for tests.

It appears not everyone experienced long lines outside of the LCBO when they wanted to get a rapid testing kit on Friday.

In Mississauga, Sheryl said she saw someone walking out of the LCBO near Eglinton and Hurontario with what looked like a rapid test, and when she went inside, “they had a big box and they were handing them out, so I grabbed one.”

Sheryl tells CityNews 680 she was “ecstatic” to walk in, “no line up, no nothing,” and get a test kit, adding it was important for her to get one because her daughter isn’t vaccinated, “and she’s coming for Christmas, and I want to make sure that everyone is safe.”

A different outcome for the people waiting in line at the LCBO at Meadowvale Town Centre, they were told to go home after no testing kits arrived. Some people tell CityNews they waited for more than 10 hours and were reassured the kits were set to arrive.