White House Aims To Cut Funds For Testing, CDC, NIH In Next Relief Package
In other news about testing and the administration: California Gov. Gavin Newsom was reportedly told to appeal directly to President Donald Trump and to thank him if Newsom wanted help in getting more testing swabs. And Colorado's governor calls the national testing situation a "complete disgrace."
The Trump administration is seeking to phase out funding for coronavirus testing and contact tracing, as well as funds for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the National Institutes of Health in a forthcoming GOP coronavirus relief package, according to two sources familiar with ongoing negotiations between the White House and Senate Republicans. The Washington Post first reported these negotiations, which according to two officials are not going over well with Republicans. (Turner and Thomas, 7/19)
The counter-narrative began almost instantly. After the U.S. count of Covid-19 cases began an inexorable rise in June, the White House sought to assure Americans that the increase was, basically, an illusion, created by an increase in testing for the novel coronavirus. (Begley, 7/20)
White House officials told California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) he would need to personally appeal to President Trump and thank him if he wanted aid in obtaining coronavirus test swabs, according to聽The New York Times. The move was part of a deliberate decision by the Trump administration in mid-April when the White House, deciding the pandemic was on the downslope, decided it had given state governments all the aid they would need to handle any further outbreaks, the Times reported. (Budryk, 7/19)
Colorado Gov. Jared Polis on Sunday said national testing for Covid-19 is disastrously slow. 鈥淭he national testing scene is a complete disgrace,鈥 Polis said Sunday on NBC鈥檚 鈥淢eet the Press.鈥 鈥淪o, every test we send out to private lab partners nationally, Quest, Labcorp, seven days, eight days, nine days 鈥 maybe six days if we're lucky. Almost useless from an epidemiological or even diagnostic perspective." (Cohen, 7/19)
Mayor Bill de Blasio, faced in May with the task of monitoring the spread of coronavirus among a population of more than 8 million people, wanted community buy-in for his city鈥檚 mammoth contact tracing program to work. So he created an advisory board and stacked it with community leaders and public health experts. Two months later, members say the city has ignored the committee鈥檚 recommendations on an issue central to the program鈥檚 success: protecting privacy. (Eisenberg, 7/17)
