NBC News reports:
President Donald Trump on Friday criticized the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention for being ill-prepared to test for the coronavirus and he blamed President Barack Obama for the situation.
Two issues have led to the slow process in testing for COVID-19. One was that the CDC had initially put out narrow guidelines for who could be considered for testing. Those criteria were eventually expanded and so far about 11,000 specimens have been tested, according to the CDC.
South Korea, on the other hand, has been testing nearly 20,000 people each day for the disease, according to reports. There were also technical issues with the test kits in which they tested for more than just the novel coronavirus, and the glitch affected the integrity of the kit.
For decades the @CDCgov looked at, and studied, its testing system, but did nothing about it. It would always be inadequate and slow for a large scale pandemic, but a pandemic would never happen, they hoped. President Obama made changes that only complicated things further…..
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) March 13, 2020
…. Their response to H1N1 Swine Flu was a full scale disaster, with thousands dying, and nothing meaningful done to fix the testing problem, until now. The changes have been made and testing will soon happen on a very large scale basis. All Red Tape has been cut, ready to go!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) March 13, 2020
Narrator: Obama’s response to the H1N1 swine flu was not a disaster. It was a staggering success. It was in fact Trump, whose incompetence turned his first flu season into a full scale disaster: https://t.co/D62OcAjC0G pic.twitter.com/WjoGf9fF5C
— Richard Hine (@richardhine) March 13, 2020
Why won’t Trump tell us why his admin refused to use World Health organizations coronavirus test kits? That delayed testing for 2 weeks and let disease spread. Did Trump not use WHO test kit bc he wanted companies run by GOP donors to make it?! https://t.co/DcVVkmMlY5
— (((DeanObeidallah))) (@DeanObeidallah) March 13, 2020
You lying son of a Klansman, Obama’s administration tested 1M people for H1N1 within a month of the 1st U.S. diagnosis.
The first #coronavirus case in America was 2 months ago and the looney tunes Trump administration hasn’t tested 10,000 people.
Blood is on your hands.
— Bishop Talbert Swan (@TalbertSwan) March 13, 2020
Trump : he was worried about his re-election. So he stopped the test kits. Just look it up. pic.twitter.com/KNJ0WmkjGr
— Country_Deserves_More (@MyVapeBusiness) March 13, 2020
The H1N1 epidemic had a 0.03% fatality rate and millions were tested early on. Here, with a fatality rate of 20-30+ times that level, you sat on your hands and people will DIE prematurely because of it. You have BLOOD on your hands.
— (((Howard Forman))) (@thehowie) March 13, 2020