With two FEMA coronavirus testing sites further north, N.J. lawmakers ask: What about South Jersey?

New Jersey officials are pressing the Federal Emergency Management Agency to open a coronavirus testing site in South Jersey as they watch cases soar in that part of the state, saying the two existing FEMA sites are too far to the north.

“We need a third FEMA site … in South Jersey, and we need it now," U.S. Rep. Andy Kim said Thursday. “This is how we’re able to keep watch. If we don’t have a coordinated and sustained testing regime, we’re not going to be able to keep watch on the virus as we restart the economy.”

The absence of a FEMA site in South Jersey has left it to county officials and hospitals to run testing sites in places like Camden and Burlington Counties, New Jersey lawmakers said. They argue that local governments don’t have the manpower, equipment, and resources that FEMA can deploy.

Though South Jersey accounts for only 11% of confirmed coronavirus cases in the state, lawmakers worry that the many retirees who live in the southern Shore are among the people most vulnerable to the virus.

“We’re seeing just over the last seven days upward of a 300% increase in positive cases in Burlington County and Ocean County. We’re seeing just a tremendous increase, and we really need to make sure we’re on top of this,” Kim, a Democrat whose district includes both counties, said Tuesday.

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Officials in those areas, he said, “are constantly talking to me about the difficulties of having a steady stream of test kits, of having the personal protective equipment needed for the workers at the test sites." He added: “We’re not going to ever get to the scale that we need to adequately understand and reliably understand the impact of this virus at South Jersey and the Shore until we get the federal government involved.”

Kim and the entire New Jersey congressional delegation, along with both of the state’s senators, wrote to FEMA in late March asking for the agency to open a third testing site in the state, backing a push by Gov. Phil Murphy.

Kim pressed the issue with FEMA’s regional director Tuesday during a conference call with the state’s congressional delegation. He got no commitment, and prodded agency officials again Thursday in a news conference with Murphy.

“There’s really nothing else that we can do more important than understanding where this virus is in order to be able to slow the spread of this,” Kim said.

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North Jersey is the center of the state’s outbreak, accounting for two-thirds of the cases and nearly 70% of fatalities. South Jersey also accounts for 11% of the state’s cases and death toll; the other cases are in Central New Jersey. Burlington and Ocean Counties have had 140 deaths as of Thursday out of the 1,700 statewide, according to state data.

Since the early days of the state’s response to the pandemic, Murphy has actively sought FEMA’s help to set up mobile testing sites in North Jersey. The agency opened its first mobile testing site in Bergen County March 20. It was flooded with residents, causing the site to shut down temporarily after testing nearly 600 people.

Three days later, a site in Holmdel began operating. Murphy has secured an arrangement with federal officials so FEMA can run these sites until May 31.

FEMA’s testing sites have filled a critical demand in North Jersey. Each can collect up to 500 samples per day and get test results in two to five days. Health officials have said this scale of testing is crucial to taming the pandemic by giving epidemiologists data on how to adapt the state’s response to the virus’ spread.

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But their locations in the state’s current hot spots have left South Jersey without adequate resources, federal lawmakers say. Holmdel, the closer of the two FEMA testing sites, is 70 miles northeast of Camden and more than 80 miles from Atlantic City.

“It is our understanding that only individuals residing within 50 miles of each site are eligible to be tested. This leaves over one million New Jerseyans out of range from receiving a test at any federally resourced facility,” the congressional delegation wrote to FEMA in a bipartisan letter March 27. “As you know, seniors are among the most vulnerable groups of people to COVID-19; approximately eight out of 10 deaths reported in the U.S. occurred in adults aged 65 years and older. The southern region of New Jersey has numerous townships which are among the localities with the highest percentage of seniors in the entire state.”

New Jersey has been ravaged by the coronavirus more than any other state except New York. More than 51,000 people have tested positive for the disease.