New York's Cuomo says Trump agrees to help expand coronavirus testing
22 April, 2020
President Donald Trump and NY Governor Andrew Cuomo, two prominent figures in america coronavirus crisis who tend to be at odds, emerged from a White House meeting on Tuesday with mostly positive what to say and an apparent deal on testing.
Cuomo, a Democrat whose state is the epicenter of the united states coronavirus epidemic with practically 20,000 deaths, said the Republican president decided on an idea for doubling New York's coronavirus screening capacity to 40,000 tests each day.
Under that plan, Cuomo said, the federal government will procure and furnish the test kits and related materials, like the chemical reagents that have sometimes experienced short supply.
The state will be in charge of expanding the capability of some 300 laboratories conducting the tests and hiring the required staff.
"That is a smart division of labor - let each layer of government do what it can best," Cuomo told a news briefing after his rare face-to-face face with Trump, a man with whom the governor has already established a testy relationship at best in the media.
He said the testing would mix diagnostic screenings used to determine if someone is carrying the virus, and serology tests in which blood samples are analyzed for the occurrence of antibodies, an indication of exposure even after a person is no more infected.
Cuomo said it'll "take weeks at best" to implement the program.
"It's in some ways an outrageous goal, but that is NY, and we're used to outrageous," he said, adding that the state's current level of 20,000 tests a day marked the highest per-capita rate for diagnostic coronavirus screening on the globe.
As of Tuesday, NY state had tallied a lot more than 257,000 cases of COVID-19, the highly contagious respiratory illness caused by the novel coronavirus. That accounts for greater than a quarter of the 809,000-plus known infections nationwide.
Budget shortfall
Health experts say a massive expansion in both kinds of tests is vital before stay-at-home orders and mandatory business shutdowns, that have been ordered to slow the spread of the virus, could be safely lifted.
Cuomo, who said he also stressed the severe nature of the state's budget problems brought on by the pandemic, described his conversation with Trump as "honest and open."
At a separate White House briefing, Trump called his ending up in Cuomo productive and said he was pleased with the partnership his administration has forged with NY.
With social distancing and lockdowns showing results, Cuomo has said he could commence to consider how exactly to reopen circumstances that ranges from NEW YORK, with more than 8 million people, to farm country and sparsely populated towns.
Trump said the government will work with New York to greatly help secure additional convenience of testing, the importance of which the president has at times minimized.
Cuomo also told Trump New York City no longer needed the united states Naval Ship Comfort hospital ship to greatly help with overflow patients.
And also other governors, Cuomo has called on the government to provide direct cash assistance to the states, a request that has gone unanswered in the stimulus packages passed by Congress.
NY, facing a $10 billion to $15 billion budget shortfall, requires a cash infusion to pay teachers, police officers, healthcare workers, Cuomo said.
The governor said Trump indicated he understood and promised to "work hard" to obtain funding for states within the next round of legislation.
Source: www.thejakartapost.com
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