Free COVID testing site draws concerns after Tucsonans fail to get results

The free COVID-19 test site in a parking lot in Oro Valley promised “quick results.”

Five weeks later, Dave and Marge Randall are still waiting — and wondering if the whole thing was nothing more than an attempt to get their personal information.

Unknown to them at the time, the testing site operator had a blank Facebook page, a phone number no one answered, and a CEO linked to at least a dozen other websites selling T-shirts, business signs, photo booths, promotional banners and other items.

The couple also didn’t know the FBI has warned the public against free COVID-19 tests from unfamiliar sources. Such offers are “potential indicators of fraudulent activity” often linked to identity theft, the agency said.

For the past several weeks, an entity named Allyhealth.us has been offering free tests in two Tucson-area parking lots — one at Grant and North Stone roads, the other at North Oracle and East Magee roads in Oro Valley where the Randalls were tested Jan. 20.

A representative of Allyhealth.us, who initially identified himself to the Arizona Daily Star as Jim Miller — but later acknowledged in an email that it wasn’t his real name — did not dispute that some Tucsonans did not receive their COVID-19 test results, nor did he dispute that calls to the company phone number were not answered.

In a brief phone interview, he blamed the missing test results on cellphone firms that blocked the company’s text messages and said the unanswered phone calls were due to three lazy employees who “probably watched Netflix all day” instead of taking calls.

The problems have been rectified, and the company plans to continue operating in the Tucson area, he said.

“Miller” did not respond by deadline to several follow-up questions including a request for his real name.

The CEO, identified in website registration records as Abid A. Shariff, did not respond to three email requests for comment. Shariff’s email address has been used to register at least 12 different business websites in the past six years, the registration records show.

“We gave them everything”

Marge Randall, a retired East Coast banker who lives part time in the Tucson area with her husband, a retired engineer, said she’s normally the suspicious type — the sort who would ask probing questions if an elderly person came into her bank to make a withdrawal with an unfamiliar companion.

But her throat was feeling scratchy the day the couple noticed balloons flying at a free testing site under a blue pop-up canopy in a parking lot North Oracle Road. And fears were high about omicron, the coronavirus variant said to be extremely contagious.

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“Every cough and sneeze can make you wonder if you have it,” she said.

Marge Randall said she and her husband were promised test results in “three or four days.” When they didn’t arrive she repeatedly called the phone number listed on a flyer from the test site, but no one picked up.

Weeks went by and neither one ended up getting sick, so by that time the test results were moot, she said. But the thought that their personal information may now be at risk is chilling.

“It’s scary,” she said. “We gave them everything, emails, phone numbers, They photocopied my driver’s license.

“It all seemed so legitimate.”

Fakes can be hard to spot

Allyhealth isn’t the only local test site to raise concerns.

Another entity called the Center for COVID Control, which ran a pop-up site on East Speedway near North Kolb Road late last year, is part of an Illinois-based chain under FBI investigation, USA Today recently reported.

The company recently announced all its testing locations are closed indefinitely.

The attorneys general of two states, Minnesota and Washington have filed lawsuits alleging the firm is a “sham” operation that contributed to the spread of COVID-19 by providing false test results or no results at all. The Arizona Attorney General’s Office has not announced any similar actions and does not disclose when a company is under investigation.

The FBI says trusted medical providers are the best source for COVID-19 tests. The Pima County Health Department sponsors about a dozen free testing sites, some of which do not require appointments and some major pharmacy chains offer drive-up COVID testing.

Fake test sites “can be hard to spot,” the Federal Trade Commission said in a bulletin last month.

“They look real, with legitimate-looking signs, tents, hazmat suits, and realistic-looking tests. And the damage (they) can cause is very real.”