GRANT COUNTY — The Grant County Health District is urging employers to stop sending asymptomatic employees to area hospitals to request coronavirus tests, saying that tests are not being administered under those conditions anywhere in the United States.

Some local employers have been sending employees without symptoms to obtain COVID-19 tests in order to document that they are not infected with the virus, the health district wrote in a statement.

“In the absence of specific COVID-like symptoms, or other specific circumstances involving close contact with infected people, this is not an appropriate use of the limited testing capacity,” the health district wrote. “It also results in a lot of unhappy employees, who discover that tests are not actually done for that purpose.”

Testing guidelines are strict, in part due to the lack of testing kits supplied by the federal government. Barring a medical provider making an exception, tests are limited to those who are experiencing symptoms (fever, coughing, shortness of breath) and who have also in the last 14 days either been in contact with a confirmed COVID-19 patient or traveled to certain countries.

Though testing capabilities have expanded in recent days and are continuing to do so, testing of non-symptomatic people is “unlikely to occur even when testing resources have improved greatly.”

“If you are an employer, please do not hinder access to justifiable testing by attempting to have your employees tested just in case,” the health district wrote.