Mar. 28—WATERTOWN — Samaritan Medical Center will close its drive-up COVID-19 testing site on Saturday as the state relaxes its requirement for testing of outpatient surgical procedure patients.

Samaritan, per state Department of Health guidance, will no longer require testing prior to outpatient surgical procedures after Saturday, the hospital announced Tuesday.

Exceptions to this are surgical patients scheduled to be an inpatient post-surgery or any surgical patient with symptoms or at the provider's discretion. Those patients will test on the day of scheduled surgery upon arrival and admission to the hospital. All patients will be screened for any COVID-19 symptoms before the procedure. Any patient that is sick or ill will be rescheduled for their surgical procedure.

The change will result in the closing of the drive-up testing location at 1575 Washington St. Other testing sites remain available at local pharmacies, as well as at North Country Family Health Center, 238 Arsenal St.

For a full listing of community-based COVID-19 testing sites, visit www.hhs.gov/coronavirus/community-based-testing-sites.