Coronavirus testing ramped up dramatically in March, as more than 195,000 coronavirus tests have been completed as of Friday, the coronavirus task force testing coordinator said.
“As you can see, this curve is going … it’ll continue to rise dramatically over the next period of time,” Adm. Brett Giroir, the assistant secretary for health at the Department of Health and Human Services, said in Saturday’s White House press briefing.
Over 50,000 tests were completed Friday alone, up from about 25,000 on Thursday.
The figures only reflect results from 91 public health laboratories and do not include statistics from the “well over 10,000 … 15,000” hospital-based labs, Giroir said, adding that the total number of tests administered and completed is likely much higher.
“From March 2 to March 14, we have put over 10 million laboratory tests into the U.S. commercial market, and we expect that by March 28 to be well over 27 million into the market,” Giroir said.
The task force has been criticized for months over making too few test kits available for doctors to prescribe to patients showing symptoms. The first round of tests rolled out by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention were shown to be inaccurate and had to be recalled. Since then, healthcare providers and patients have decried the inaccessibility of test kits.
Giroir said, though, that commercial testing is ramping up daily and will become more widely available by the end of the month.
