Trump blocks desperately needed national testing program, says tests make things “look bad”

Approved~Løki

The single most disastrous element of the failed federal response to the Covid-19 pandemic is Donald Trump’s continued refusal to launch a massive federal effort to develop the capacity to test more Americans for the virus.

Without magnitudes more testing, public health experts agree, reopening the country is a death sentence for countless Americans, particularly the less affluent. And only the federal government is capable of what’s required.

On Wednesday, Trump explained himself with an extraordinarily revealing quote – one that included both a lie and a confession.

“In a way, by doing all this testing we make ourselves look bad,” Trump told reporters on Wednesday,

It was a lie because the number of tests administered in the U.S. – currently about 7 million – is tiny compared to the actual need.

And it was a confession because Trump was acknowledging that he sees testing as a matter of his own political health rather than the public’s.

Bill

Article URL : https://presswatchers.org/2020/05/trump-blocks-desperately-needed-national-testing-program-says-tests-make-things-look-bad/