President Donald Trump said that the United States has passed the peak on new coronavirus cases, Wednesday, adding this has put the country in a very strong position to finalize new guidelines on social distancing. More than 6.3 lakh Americans have tested positive for COVID-19 so far and total fatalities as on Wednesday were nearly 28,000, the highest for any country in the world.
"The battle continues, but the data suggest that nationwide we have passed the peak on new cases. Hopefully, that will continue, and we will continue to make great progress," Trump told reporters at his daily White House news conference on coronavirus.
Noting that this has been a horrible time to see such death and destruction in the country, the President said the medical and healthcare advances the US has made are critical to the continued progress.
The United States has rapidly developed the most expansive and accurate testing system anywhere in the world and have completed more than 3.3 million tests.
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"To date, we have authorized 48 separate coronavirus tests and the FDA is working with 300 companies and labs to widen our capacity still further," he said.
The Abbott Labs Wednesday announced that it is has developed an antibody test that will determine if someone has been previously infected with the coronavirus and potentially developed immunity. "It is a great test. The company says these tests could be available to screen up to 20 million people in a matter of weeks," he added.
The administration, he said, is also distributing vast amounts of medical supplies to states across the country. Through project air bridge, which has been an amazing success they have completed 44 flights, and an additional 56 like scheduled in the near future. he said.
In total, through all channels, the federal government has developed and delivered 39.4 million N95 masks, 431 million gloves, 57 million surgical masks and 10.2 million gowns. It ordered 500 million masks and they will be coming shortly and have distributed 100 million masks, he said.
(With PTI inputs)