WASHINGTON, March 7 (NNN-AGENCIES) — The White House has acknowledged the nation does not have enough coronavirus test kits as cases of the disease ticked upwards on both US coasts.
Vice-President Mike Pence said the Trump administration would not be able to meet its objective of delivering one million testing kits this week.
At a press briefing on Monday, Food and Drug Administration Commissioner Stephan Hahn said close to a million tests would be ready by the end of this week.
But Vice-President Pence – who is co-ordinating the US response to the outbreak – conceded on Thursday that that target would not be met.
“We don’t have enough tests today to meet what we anticipate will be the demand going forward,” Pence said during a visit to a factory in Minnesota.
Speaking in Washington state in the evening, Pence said: “We still have a ways to go to ensure that tests are available.”
But he said that by the end of next week the US government’s diagnostic supplier would distribute kits across the country that would enable 1.2 million Americans to be tested for coronavirus.
Congress meanwhile moved with unusual speed to approve a bumper emergency aid package to combat the outbreak.
The US death toll from the coronavirus climbed to 12 on Thursday, with all but one of the victims in the north-western US state of Washington.
There are now more than 200 cases of Covid-19 in 20 states.
In Washington, officials in the Seattle area announced 20 new cases of the virus, bringing the total in that state to 70, according to its health department.
Nine of the US dead so far were from the same nursing home in suburban Seattle, which is now being investigated by authorities to see if it followed infection-prevention guidelines.
Some major Seattle-area businesses, including Microsoft and Amazon, have shut down some operations or urged employees to work from home.
New York saw its caseload double overnight to 22, all of them in or near the city. The city’s mayor called on the federal government to send more test kits urgently.
About 200 people have been quarantined in the US state of Rhode Island because of their links to a school trip to Italy that has resulted in three cases of the coronavirus.
San Francisco reported its first two cases of the coronavirus on Thursday. And the US state of Maryland confirmed its first three cases, in the Washington DC suburbs.
Meanwhile, officials ordered a cruise ship with about 3,500 people on board to lie at anchor off the California coast until passengers and crew can be tested, after a previous voyager on the vessel died of the virus.
On Thursday, a Coast Guard helicopter lowered test kits on to the 290m Grand Princess vessel by rope.
“The ship will not come on shore until we appropriately assess the passengers,” California Governor Gavin Newsom said.
A man who sailed on the Grand Princess last month died of the coronavirus on Wednesday. The 71-year-old from the Sacramento area had underlying health conditions, said officials.
Two other passengers from that voyage are in hospital with the virus in northern California, officials said. — NNN-AGENCIES
