US health system unprepared for coronavirus: CDC

ANKARA

The U.S. public health system is ill-prepared to offer tests to American citizens for coronavirus, according to a report by U.S. website Politico.

Citing Robert Redfield, the director of The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), Politico reported that the shortage is "threatening to delay coronavirus test results and cause officials to undercount the number of Americans with the virus."

Redfield told Politico that he is not confident that the labs have adequate supplies to extract genetic material from any virus in a patient’s sample, a crucial step in coronavirus testing.

"The availability of those reagents is obviously being looked at, I’m confident of the actual test that we have, but as people begin to operationalize the test, they realize there’s other things they need to do the test," he added.

The Trump administration, with Vice President Mike Pence at the helm of Coronavirus Task Force, said public labs have so far tested more than 5,000 people.

Alex Azar, a former pharmaceutical lobbyist, who currently serves as the Secretary of Health and Human Services, briefed lawmakers on Tuesday saying that health labs could have to deal with 10,000 to 20,000 people every day.

According to Robin Patel, president of the American Society for Microbiology, "increased demand for testing has the potential to exhaust supplies needed to perform the test itself”.

"That would limit the testing capacity of public health, hospital and commercial labs alike," she told the magazine.

The U.S. has reported 19 deaths from the virus -- 18 in Washington and one in California.

Citing the report of the World Health Organization (WHO) mission to China, which described the virus as being highly contagious, CDC said: "There’s essentially no immunity against this virus in the population because it’s a new virus."

"Based on this, it’s fair to say that as the trajectory of the outbreak continues, many people in the United States will at some point in time either this year or next be exposed to this virus and there’s a good chance many will become sick," CDC warned.

The novel coronavirus which originated in China has sounded global alarm with cases reported in 114 countries.

More than 4,200 people have died, with over 118,000 cases reported worldwide, according to the WHO.