the coronavirus crisis
Trump disagrees with Fauci on testing capacity, says U.S. is 'doing a great job'
During Thursday's coronavirus briefing, President Trump said he disagrees with Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, who said the United States is "not in a situation where we can say we are exactly where we want to be with regard to testing" capacity for coronavirus.
Fauci, who did not attend the briefing, made his remarks earlier in the day during an interview with Time. When asked by reporters about Fauci's comments, Trump said, "No, I don't agree with him on that. No, I think we're doing a great job on testing. If he said that, I don't agree with him."
Fauci said when it comes to COVID-19 testing, the United States needs to "significantly ramp up not only the number of tests, but the capacity to perform them, so that you don't have a situation where you have a test but it can't be done because there isn't a swab, or because there isn't extraction media, or not the right vial. I am not overly confident right now at all that we have what it takes to do that. We are doing better, and I think we are going to get there, but we are not there yet."
Trump has claimed multiple times, including on Thursday, that the United States has done "more tests than all other countries combined." The U.S. has conducted more than 4.6 million COVID-19 tests, but lags behind Germany and Italy in per capita tests performed.