With many schools and businesses all across the country planning to reopen soon, the Trump administration announced a plan on Monday to distribute over 150 million rapid coronavirus test kits. These “game changing” test kits were made by Abbott Laboratories and can quickly and efficiently determine whether or not a patient has contracted coronavirus. 100 million of the total 150 million tests “will be given to states and territories as support efforts to reopen their economies and schools immediately and [as] fast as they can,” and 50 million of the test kits will go “to protect the most vulnerable communities” such as nursing homes, hospice care, historically black colleges, etc.
Trump is taking a new approach to fighting the coronavirus issue and is beginning to encourage testing among states and cities, which many see as a step in the right direction. Many experts, including Jennifer Nuzzo, an epidemiologist from John Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public health, are pleased that the federal government is “trying to invest in technologies that would expand the number of tests that could be done in the US.” Furthermore, although these tests are aimed to help reopen schools and businesses, the federal administration is giving these kits to the state governments and allowing them to choose how they will be distributed, although they do encourage states to follow what the Trump Administration is aiming for.
This freedom given to states may seem positive in theory, but there are many issues with the overall plan. According to many states, there is a big lack of communication and planning between states and the federal government. Many health officials from states claim that they are given no say to the distribution of the kits and many facilities are given little to no notice as to when the kits are being delivered. This lack of planning has irritated many states, with one state official claiming that “[The Trump Administration’s] approach is to just throw things over the fence to the states and to say, ‘take this, and deal with the problem.’” On top of all of that, providing 150 million test kits may seem to be a good improvement, but “150 million tests is really a very small drop in the bucket, considering how these tests are envisioned to be used,” according to Nuzzo. So although sending these kits is a positive action for the federal administration in their efforts to end the coronavirus pandemic, much more action and planning must be done to effectively stop the disease from spreading.
Source 1: NY Times
Source 2: Washington Post
Source 3: CNN
4 comments:
Hearing that the federal government is supporting a mass distribution of rapid coronavirus tests definitely makes me feel hopeful for the future, however, I do agree with you Max that there's still a ways to go before we can celebrate these tests.
While leaving the distribution of these tests up to the states certainly makes sense, I worry that the lack of a uniform plan will only hinder the effectivity of the tests. If each state is distributing the tests in different ways at different times I can't imagine the virus would be successfully dampened. Furthermore, even while 150 million feels like and is a huge number, the number of tests necessary to wipe out COVID is much larger. If you put it into perspective of just Aragon, we would need every student and staff member to get tested every 3 days in order to truly ensure no one at Aragon is at risk. There are at least 1600 individuals on Aragon's campus, if not more. We are going to need 1600 tests for every single person at least twice a week. And that same standard will have to be applied to every school, office space and beyond.
Nonetheless, it is clear that we are making progress in eliminating COVID, but is the federal government doing it as efficiently as they can?
I completely agree with you Claire. The number might seem quite large at first, but with many experts claiming that they may require a few million tests each day to adequately slow the spread of COVID, it is very likely a larger distribution of tests will be required. With more tests needed to be spread across the country, this will further lead to the questioning of the federal government's ability to distribute such tests effectively. Hopefully the increasing news of the spread of COVID as well as the president contracting COVID will support the need to efficiently send tests across the entire nation as the economic begins to open again.
The federal government sending out these coronavirus tests can only be a good thing, since it means that the states will be able to use them to hopefully control the spread of the pandemic. The tests are even more important for vulnerable communities, as being able to test quickly could be crucial to saving the lives of many people who are at increased risk from the disease. The main issue with this plan is whether or not it is the most efficient and effective way to get tests to the people who need it, and if that number of tests will be enough. I agree with Claire in that the current number is inadequate compared to the population of the US, which is more than double the number of tests being sent out. Furthermore, the distribution of 2/3 of the tests is being left up to the state governments, which has its advantages and disadvantages. Allowing the states to take control of their own testing could be beneficial because each state is at a different point in the road to recovery from COVID, but this might lead to testing being disorganized without the federal government to oversee the process. However, I'm still hopeful that this plan will turn out well.
I think that the timing of this was late because many schools in the US have already been open for weeks even before the federal government had shipped these test kits, which are meant to help schools reopen. Of course, these tests will definitely help schools and businesses that have not yet reopened and are struggling to do so. However, judging from the comments by state officials, I believe that the federal government should have planned the distribution of the tests out more. Quickly delivering tests to nursing homes to save lives, the federal government in its attempt to make haste had omitted a standardized reporting system. States will have a more difficult time adding results to their counts of infections and maintaining organization. Overall, I think this plan had good intentions but its planning could have been improved significantly.
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