China News Service, September 29. According to a report by the US Chinese website, on the 28th local time, US President Trump announced that the federal government will begin distributing 150 million new coronavirus rapid test kits to states this week to urge governors to let Students from kindergarten to grade 12 return to school.
Data map: US President Trump.
According to reports, Trump said in the Rose Garden of the White House, "I am happy to announce plans to distribute 150 million Abbott (pharmaceutical companies) rapid test reagents in the next few weeks."
Trump said that approximately 100 million test kits will be given to states and territories to support their efforts to reopen their economies and schools immediately and as quickly as possible. 50 million tests will be used to "protect the most vulnerable Communities", including nursing homes, assisted living facilities, traditional African-American universities, etc.
At present, the number of deaths in the United States has exceeded 200,000, and the number of new confirmed cases of new crowns daily is still at the level of about 40,000. Experts warn that infections may increase sharply with the arrival of autumn and winter.
On September 23, local time, a store in Manhattan, New York City launched a "bubble tent" to increase the social distance between customers.
According to the report, testing will be allocated according to the population of each state and used when the governor deems it appropriate, but the federal government encourages states to give priority to schools.
A senior government official with knowledge of the plan told the Associated Press that 6.5 million reagents will be distributed this week, and a total of 100 million will be distributed to the governor in the coming weeks.
The official said that the federal government is emphasizing the use of tests in schools.
For example, Abbott’s laboratory tests will allow teachers to test once a week, or let parents know if their child with symptoms is infected with the virus; in some cases, states can also perform some basic tasks, such as weekly or daily Test a certain percentage of students every month to ensure that the infection rate remains low.
The report pointed out that these tests came from the previously announced 150 million orders from Abbott.
The company's rapid test is the first test that can be processed without special computer equipment.
It can produce results in about 15 minutes.
Abbott’s tests are inexpensive and easy to use, but the disadvantage is that they are less accurate and usually require higher-level laboratory tests to confirm positive results.
In addition, because these tests are usually performed outside the health insurance system, state officials warned that many test results will not be included in the report.
This may result in an undercount of new cases, which may make the government data needed to track the virus inaccurate.
In the last two months, the testing capabilities of the United States have generally exceeded demand. Brett Girol, a senior government official in charge of virus testing, recently told Congress that the United States will soon be able to conduct an average of 3 million tests per day. According to data from the Epidemic Tracking Project, the United States currently conducts an average of 900,000 tests per day.