At a Friday afternoon press conference at Bergen Community College in Paramus, Elmwood Park-based BioReference Laboratories Inc., an OPKO Health company, announced a collaboration with the state to provide COVID-19 testing across New Jersey.

BioReference will provide testing for the state’s first drive-thru facilities in Burlington, Essex, Hudson, Ocean and Union counties. LabCorp will also perform COVID-19 testing, Gov. Phil Murphy announced Friday.

“Our industry is working around the clock to perform testing for COVID-19 in New Jersey and the rest of the country,” William Haas, Raritan, NJ-based senior vice president of LabCorp Diagnostics’ Northeast Division said. “We are doing everything we can to keep people healthy and support the public response to COVID-19.”

“Expanded testing is imperative to protecting the people most susceptible to this epidemic, specifically senior citizens, people with chronic health problems, and those with compromised immune systems,” said Murphy at the event. “We are grateful for this partnership with BioReference, as it means the people of New Jersey will have increased access to testing and faster results, helping limit the spread of COVID-19.”

Murphy said that 600 people were tested at the drive-thru test center that opened Friday morning at Bergen Community College.

At the press conference Dr. Jon Cohen, executive chairman of BioReference Laboratories, said the company has ramped-up to 20,000 tests per day.

“We are prioritizing. We have several of the large health systems who are sending us their criticals, and those are patients that are in the hospital,” Cohen said. “Those patients particularly need turn around times within a very short period of time to help the front line employees –physicians, nurses, medical workers – to make sure they can make the diagnosis as soon as possible.”

Cohen said that BioReference is beginning to look at tests for first responders, police, firemen and EMTs with the goal of figuring out how to get them screened.

“It is a privilege to offer testing to residents of New Jersey, where the majority of our 4,000 employees live,” he said in prepared remarks delivered before the event.

To cope with the anticipated patient surge from COVID-19, the state health department is working with Inspira Health Network to bring Underwood Memorial Hospital in Woodbury back online as an acute care center. On Friday, Health Commissioner Judith Persichilli said the facility, which has been closed since December, will reopen within three to four weeks.

She also announced that a closed 200-bed, 100,000-square-foot hospital in Plainfield is expected to be re-opened within four to five weeks.

Editor’s note: This story was updated at 4:24 p.m. EST on March 20, 2020 to include additional comments from BioReference Laboratories Executive Chairman Dr. Jon Cohen and to include additional information about Labcorp.