As Trump coronavirus testing strategy lags, Senate Democrats propose $30bn plan

Senate Democrats on Wednesday proposed a $30bn plan for a “comprehensive national testing strategy” that party leaders hope to include in the next coronavirus response package.

The $30bn proposal fills the void left by the Trump administration, which has yet to roll out a comprehensive federal testing plan of its own, despite the president and many of his top advisers expressing their desire to begin reopening parts of the economy in May.

Health experts have warned that reopening the economy without proper testing or “contact tracing” — the ability to track and quarantine people who have come into contact with others who have tested positive for Covid-19 — could lead to a resurgence of the coronavirus infection rate.

Those experts have said the US needs to be testing 500,000 people per day at a minimum. That’s far more than the roughly 140,000 Americans who are now being tested per day.

“If the president won’t do this, we have to do it,” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer told reporters on a call.

“We would very much like it to be part of the next [legislative coronavirus] package because it is so necessary,” the New York Democrat added.

Mr Trump on Tuesday evening tried to shift blame for what experts say is a low testing rate to state executives, contending during his daily coronavirus briefing that his administration has "created incredible tests."

"Individual states and the governors will be held accountable," the president said of plans he wants those governors to present to the White House for opening their states. "If they need things, we will help them get those things. But we want them to do their testing. We want them because they're equipped to do testing." Many governors, however, report the opposite.

Administration officials have been drafting plans to phase in the reopening of the economy beginning in May that calls for a surge in testing before 15 May, The Washington Post reported earlier this week.

But healthcare administrators have complained that the country’s health infrastructure is not nearly ready to test on the requisite scale to get Americans safely back to work. Among myriad other issues, there is a shortage of the types of swabs needed for testing, and only one factory in the US is manufacturing them right now.

Senate Democrats on Wednesday urged Mr Trump to use his powers under the Defence Production Act (DPA) to compel other American companies to begin producing more testing equipment.

The president has been reluctant to pursue that, suggesting that states should take charge of procuring their own testing equipment. He also contends he has used the DPA like a "hammer" to get companies to bend to his whims, despite widespread reports of shortages.

One of Democrats’ top priorities is ensuring free testing reaches “every community,” including those with predominantly minority, tribal, and older populations, said Oregon Senator Patty Murray, the top Democrat on the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labour, and Pensions.

The virus is doing “the most harm” to people whom “the healthcare system has left behind,” Ms Murray added, alluding to data released by many states and cities that show Covid-19 is infecting and killing black people at disproportionately high rates.

As just one example, 70 per cent of people in Louisiana who have died from the disease are black – even though black people represent roughly one-third of the state’s population, according to data released earlier this month.