Explaining Away One Million Expired COVID Tests
It was this year; a question arose on the distribution of Covid tests to the states and why shouldn’t some states receive more tests than others. The question referenced Florida as one of those states. The question was put to Jen Psaki, White House Press Secretary.
I admire Jen for the job she does as there is no mincing of words or delays in her responses to the adversarial reporters in the mix. Her answer was (my memory), the tests are distributed by allocation to states. Which makes sense as a million of the tests do not appear overnight and manufacturing sites must be approved for manufacturing of medical supplies, GMP, FDA, USDA regulations all apply (drawing from my experience). There is a constant stream of Covid tests being delivered.
“Amid the delay in the roll-out of Biden’s plan, DeSantis —- who is widely speculated as a potential 2024 Republican presidential candidate —- appears to be pushing for a race with the federal government to get tests shipped out first.” Competition with Joe Biden pushes Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis to do his job | Blogs (orlandoweekly.com)
If only Florida had enough tests, Florida could be testing more people. DeSantis could be testing more of those people who are more vulnerable.
“The governor’s comments came a day after state Surgeon General Joseph Ladapo announced the Florida Department of Health intends to publish new testing guidelines aimed at emphasizing “high-value testing,” which he said would target seniors and medically vulnerable individuals.” Competition with Joe Biden pushes Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis to do his job | Blogs (orlandoweekly.com)
As an explanation of why this direction:
Ladapo: “The guidance that we’re going to be putting out will be talking about … testing based on risk factors, based on risk level. Because that’s the primary item that determines whether or not a test is actually likely to make a difference.” Competition with Joe Biden pushes Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis to do his job | Blogs (orlandoweekly.com)
As others have noted, fewer tests can equate to fewer cases of Covid. I am sure DeSantis will also be commenting on a lack of Covid tests to accomplish his plans. Set aside, this should have been accomplished well before Biden took office. Republicans have been telling people they do not need testing and should not be told to be vaccinated. What do we have , 60 or so percent of the people vaccinated?
“298,455 new coronavirus cases were recorded in the week that ended Dec. 30 in Florida. More than double the number of cases reported a week earlier.”
“DeSantis: A lot of those tests (testing everyone who believes they may have caught Covid) are not a good use of testing. Testing really needs to be focused on the people that have clinical symptoms. So you have people that are symptomatic, and they may not have as good of access because you have so many other tests being used in ways which really aren’t a good use of resources,” Competition with Joe Biden pushes Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis to do his job | Blogs (orlandoweekly.com)
Is throwing Covid tests away because they expired a good use of them?
On Dec. 30, Fried, a Democrat who is running against DeSantis for Florida governor, released a statement saying it had come to her attention that the Florida Department of Health had a “significant number” of COVID-19 tests about to expire.
and . . .
During a press conference with DeSantis Thursday in West Palm Beach, Kevin Guthrie, the director of the state Division of Emergency Management, confirmed that Florida had between 800,000 and 1 million COVID-19 tests that expired between Dec. 26-30.
According to Guthrie, they had originally expired in September, but the state received a three-month extension on those test kits from the manufacturer and federal regulators.
What was suggested? Florida could have offered their tests to other states if they were not needed in Florida. They didn’t. One question to Jen Psaki was “how are tests being allocated?” Florida already misused a large quantity of tests. Republicans blaming Dems for their mistakes . . .
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/12/23/us/covid-vaccine-biden-trump.html
December 23, 2021
Beneath a Covid Vaccine Debacle, 30 Years of Government Culpability
Washington has rejected plans to revamp vaccine preparedness for decades and repeatedly paid a price. The Biden administration is at a similar crossroads.
By Chris Hamby and Sheryl Gay Stolberg
[ The range of problems have been evident from January 2020 and there needs to be an accounting. ]
ltr
So, the Cures Act dealing with the approval of new drugs was a big nothing?
I expressly referenced the problems in manufacture of vaccines with the New York Times article. Since those problems resulted in the loss of large amounts of vaccines, editors at the Times considered the matter important to investigate.
I in no way criticized your fine writing, but rather thought I was adding. Obviously I was as usual wrong.
Sorry for the bother.
ltr
A “huge” leap to the negative by you . . .
The Cures Act allows the FDA to being drugs to market sooner.
Quit being so sensitive.
January 9, 2022
Coronavirus
United States
Cases ( 61,263,030)
Deaths ( 859,356)
Deaths per million ( 2,573)
China
Cases ( 103,619)
Deaths ( 4,636)
Deaths per million ( 3)
Well, I guess you could say this is a win for despotism, although I would take all those China figures with a large grain of salt. I would also note that the American figures are also probably undercounts since the illiberal regimes already established in about 1/3 of the states are also doing their best to not report the actual numbers of cases, hospitalizations, and deaths.
https://news.cgtn.com/news/2022-01-10/Chinese-mainland-records-157-confirmed-COVID-19-cases-16Hx5oBwmQ0/index.html
January 10, 2022
Chinese mainland reports 157 new COVID-19 cases
The Chinese mainland recorded 157 confirmed COVID-19 cases on Sunday, with 97 linked to local transmissions and 60 from overseas, data from the National Health Commission showed on Monday.
A total of 42 new asymptomatic cases were also recorded, and 699 asymptomatic patients remain under medical observation.
Confirmed cases on the Chinese mainland now total 103,776, with the death toll remaining unchanged at 4,636 since January last year.
Chinese mainland new locally transmitted cases
https://news.cgtn.com/news/2022-01-10/Chinese-mainland-records-157-confirmed-COVID-19-cases-16Hx5oBwmQ0/img/6d5fc4c200134562abc2948250804706/6d5fc4c200134562abc2948250804706.jpeg
Chinese mainland new imported cases
https://news.cgtn.com/news/2022-01-10/Chinese-mainland-records-157-confirmed-COVID-19-cases-16Hx5oBwmQ0/img/277289dbd2ff42278ce117de54b8f444/277289dbd2ff42278ce117de54b8f444.jpeg
Chinese mainland new asymptomatic cases
https://news.cgtn.com/news/2022-01-10/Chinese-mainland-records-157-confirmed-COVID-19-cases-16Hx5oBwmQ0/img/608de59c188a41c2abee0af25b858c21/608de59c188a41c2abee0af25b858c21.jpeg
http://www.xinhuanet.com/english/20220110/6fdd67c3ae404cbfae007fc9c030500b/c.html
January 10, 2022
Nearly 2.9 bln COVID-19 vaccine doses administered on Chinese mainland
BEIJING — Nearly 2.9 billion COVID-19 vaccine doses had been administered on the Chinese mainland as of Sunday, data from the National Health Commission showed Monday.
[ Chinese coronavirus vaccine yearly production capacity is more than 7 billion doses. Along with nearly 2.9 billion doses of Chinese vaccines administered domestically, more than 2 billion doses have already been distributed to more than 120 countries internationally. Nineteen countries are now producing Chinese vaccines from delivered raw materials. ]
The test situation I think is going to get tighter in coming weeks as the OSHA rule gets implemented….unless it doesn’t get implemented. Employers are waking up to the reality that testing only unvaccinated workers once a week isn’t going to be enough if the safety goal is to keep coronavirus out of the workplace. Workplace testing is set to skyrocket (if they can find the tests) as even vaccinated workers are going to want their employer to include them in these programs.