The White House blocked Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, from testifying last week, saying it was counter-productive. President Donald Trump went further on Tuesday, saying the decision was because his Democratic critics control the House; Fauci is set to join other senior federal health officials at a hearing on the pandemic in the GOP-controlled Senate next week.
The House panel instead heard testimony from Obama administration CDC Director Tom Frieden and Caitlin Rivers, a senior scholar at the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security. Both said the U.S. needs to at least triple its current level of testing in order to safely reopen, adding there appears to be no comprehensive federal plan or enough medical supplies to do so.
Cole also lamented testing delays over the last few months that he said have set the country back. About 1.75 million diagnostic tests have been processed in the past week. Frieden and Rivers said at least 3.5 million people should be tested weekly.
“We were a little slow getting our private sector partners into the fight,“ Cole said. „I don’t think we mobilized them nearly as rapidly as we probably should have, in retrospect.”
Source: politico.com
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