Adm. Giroir demonstrates rapid COVID-19 test
Adm. Brett Giroir, the federal official overseeing coronavirus testing in the United States, on Monday demonstrated the rapid coronavirus tests that will be distributed across the country.
Video Transcript
BRETT GIROIR: On August 27, after months of planning and only after one day after the FDA authorization, the Trump administration awarded a contract for $760 million to Abbott for the delivery of 150 million of these Abbott BinaxNOW rapid tests.
The BinaxNOW detects the presence of the COVID antigen. It uses a specific nasal swab, and that-- oops-- that swab comes with the test, and it's made by Puritan. And the reason why Puritan swabs are here is because the administration used the DPA and $120 million in investment to make these swabs able for-- to use by Abbott.
It does not require an instrument to determine the result. It's 15-- it's in 15 minutes, the result. Testing may be performed by laboratories where the clear certificate of waiver-- this is not a home test, but during the health emergency, Seema Verma and CMS permits laboratories to extend their certificate to operate in temporary sites like schools or churches or parking lots.
So though I-- we anticipate that the test will generally be performed by a trained individual on a patient, I will demonstrate a self-swab for you, to show you just exactly how easy the test is performed.
So literally, it almost could not be easier. It starts with 6 drops of liquid onto this piece of paper. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6. And then there's a nasal swab, and again, this is-- this is not the deep-brain biopsy that we talk about. This will generally done by a healthcare provider, but it can be done supervised. It's this easy-- 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. Into the test. Twist it three times. The adhesive is pulled off, and you wait 15 minutes. And that is the test. It really could not be easier then this. This is a very sophisticated little piece of cardboard with lots of antibodies and incredible technology into that.
We've already shipped 65,000 of these to disaster operations in California, Oregon, Texas, and Louisiana. And we have already shipped 2.1 million tests to 7,600 nursing homes, over 900,000 tests to assisted living, 300,000 tests to the Indian Health Service, and 339,000 tests to historically Black colleges and university.
Today we start the shipment of a hundred million tests to governors, beginning with a total of 6.5 million tests this week-- to be shipped this week.
