U.S. Has Tested Fewer Than 6,000 Virus Samples, FDA Says
- Government doesn’t have full nationwide count of people tested
- Diagnosed cases in the U.S. at 376 with numbers still rising
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The U.S. has tested fewer than 6,000 samples from Americans suspected of the coronavirus infection, the top drug regulator acknowledged, as federal health officials struggled to explain the government’s difficulty creating a diagnostic tool to contain the disease.
Food and Drug Administration Commissioner Stephen Hahn said the federal government doesn’t know how many individual Americans have been tested for the infection. The number is less than the 5,861 specimens tested, because each patient requires from two and 20 tests to confirm a diagnosis, he said at a briefing for reporters at the White House on Saturday.