Test cartridges move on a production line in South Korea. CDC insistence on developing own test kits cost time.
Critics have pointed out that it could simply have accepted kits made by the World Health Organization, which has been producing them since late January, instead of insisting on developing its own test. But Navarro’s comments mark the strongest criticism by a named White House official of the CDC’s role in the administration’s slow rollout of testing.Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar defended the CDC against Navarro’s criticism, telling CBS it was never meant to be “the backbone of testing, of broad, mass testing, in the US.”
More than two months later, just 12 million Americans have been tested – less than 4% of the population.