Dr. Deborah Birx, the White House coronavirus response coordinator, says she is disappointed that 500,000 available test kits are not being used throughout the United States.
Her comments came Tuesday during the White House daily coronavirus briefing.
"It is disappointing to me right now that we have about 500,000 capacity of (tests) that are not being utilized," Birx said. "They are out. They are in the states. They are not being run and not utilized.”
She said state officials are confused by the process of obtaining the kits.
"So, now we have to figure out how do we create awareness because, sometimes, when you put an early platform out … people get dependent on that and then don't see that there's availability of other tests," Birx said. "So, right now, there are over half a million tests that are sitting…that are not being utilized. So, we’re trying to figure out how do we inform states about where these all are."
“We’ve pushed a lot of tests out, but they are not all being utilized.”
Meanwhile Abbott Laboratories announced it has received emergency approval from the Food and Drug Administration for a coronavirus test, called ID Now, which delivers positive results in five minutes and negative results in 13 minutes, according to Barron’s. The testing device will be available the first week of April.
Jeffrey Rodack ✉
Jeffrey Rodack, who has nearly a half century in news as a senior editor and city editor for national and local publications, has covered politics for Newsmax for nearly seven years.
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