Donald Trump says he’s hearing “very good things on the ground” about the availability of coronavirus tests. Oh, really?
”I watch a news conference and they tell us we have testing capacity, but I am telling you we don’t have testing capacity. It is not out there yet,” Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz said on Wednesday. He’s not alone among governors sounding the alarm.
“I think it’s critical the feds move a lot faster on this stuff,” Massachusetts Gov. Charlie Baker, a Republican, said the same day. According to Oklahoma Gov. Kevin Stitt, his state is “critically low” on test kits, and he too is looking to the federal government for help.
You want to hear more about the “very good things on the ground”?
Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker feels “a little like Charlie Brown and Lucy with the football with the federal government.”
The federal government—the Trump administration—is failing. There are not enough tests and Donald Trump keeps insisting there are, rather than doing something to turn that claim into reality. This isn’t just about setting people’s minds at ease about whether they’re sick. Experience in other countries shows that widespread testing is part of stopping the spread of the disease. Instead, in the United States, it’s being treated as a luxury good rather than a meaningful public health tool. And the people on the ground are sending up an alarm that should be heeded.