LOS ANGELES — For two weeks, Rachael Jones has stayed home, going without a paycheck while waiting and waiting for the results of a COVID-19 test from a pharmacy near Philadelphia.“I’m just so disappointed. I just don’t know how — with the resources and the people we have and the money we have — we can’t get this right,” she said.Four months, 3 million confirmed infections and over 130,000 deaths into the U.S. coronavirus outbreak, Americans confronted with an alarming resurgence of the scourge are facing long lines at testing sites in the summer heat or are getting turned away, while others are going a week or more without receiving a diagnosis.Some sites are running out of kits, while labs are reporting shortages of materials and workers to process the swabs.Some frustrated Americans are left to wonder why the U.S. can’t seem to get its act together, especially after it was given fair warning as the virus wreaked havoc in China and then Italy, Spain and New York.“It’s a hot mess,” said 47-year-old Jennifer Hudson of Tucson, Arizona. “The fact that we’re relying on companies and we don’t have a national response to this, it’s ridiculous. … It’s keeping people who need tests from getting tests.”It took Hudson five days to make an appointment through a CVS pharmacy near her home. She managed to book a drive-up test over the weekend, more than a week after her symptoms — fatigue, shortness of breath, headache and sore throat — first emerged. The clinic informed her that her results would probably be delayed.Testing has been ramped up in the U.S., reaching about 640,000 tests per day on average, an increase from around 518,000 two weeks ago, according to an Associated Press analysis. Newly confirmed infections per day in the U.S. are running at over 50,000, breaking records at practically every turn.In an especially alarming indicator, the percentage of tests coming back positive for the virus is on the rise across nearly the entire country, hitting almost 27% in Arizona, 19% in Florida and 17% in South Carolina.As more people are tested, an increase in the raw number of positive tests is to be expected. But if the virus is being brought under control, then the percentage of positive results relative to the total number of tests should be coming down.While the U.S. has conducted more tests than any other nation, it ranks in the middle of the pack in testing per capita, behind Russia, Spain and Australia, according to Johns Hopkins University.Testing alone without adequate contact tracing and quarantine measures won’t control the spread of the scourge, according to health experts. But they say delays in testing can lead to more infections by leaving people in the dark as to whether they need to isolate themselves.Thailand, South Korea and Norway, among other countries, have controlled the virus more effectively while testing fewer people per capita than the U.S., according to Johns Hopkins.In other developments:
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services announced this week that it will open loose “surge control” sites in 3 cities that are experiencing significant accumulation in cases and hospitalizations: Jacksonville, Florida; Baton Rouge, Louisiana; and Edinburg, Texas. Sites will be able to perform up to 5,000 checks per day in each city, with effects that will return in 3 to five days, the authorities said. In Georgia, one of the states where instances are increasing, officials are rushing to expand control capacity. As the call increases sharply and threatens to overwhelm six major sites around Atlanta, said Michael Thurmond, CEO of DeKalb County. “If you plan this for the next three weeks, we can’t handle it,” he said. moved away from a loose check site for the third day in a row after rejoining its daily batch of checks. Health care providers are running out of trays and chemicals needed to run the machines used in the controls. still ongoing at a daily rate well above the number needed to meet federal criteria for a New Orleans length network, he said. But Avegno said he feared that the progress of New Orleans, one of the first hot spots of the epidemic, to flatten its curve will be reversed. Jon DiMuzio underwent a check 10 days ago at a non-appointment site in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, before the Fourth of July scheduled to see his circle of relatives in Philadelphia. Occasionally I would cancel the scale because the effects had not arrived in time and I did not need to endanger those he enjoyed. He had not yet been diagnosed on Tuesday. “Last Wednesday, I was told I deserve to know until Friday or Saturday,” DiMuzio said. “Yesterday they said, “You deserve to know today or tomorrow, ” and they said the same thing today.” and emergency care clinics that provide checks are discovered. In Arizona, many others were covered last week for a large-scale check occasion on a poor segment of Phoenix that is heavily Hispanic and black. North Carolina will now allow citizens to go through checks without a doctor’s recommendation, to inspire more blacks and Hispanics. and Native Americans are controlled by the virus. But he was told that unless he had a pre-existing condition, he would not qualify. Eventually, it was discovered on a site that provided checks with quick effects. His negative result came quickly, but he discovered the joy of frustration. “We’re several months away,” he said. “How come we can’t take a check?”