Governor John Bel Edwards announces the federal government will provide Louisiana with the resources needed to administer 200,000 COVID tests a month. So far just over 150,000 tests have been performed. Edwards says starting next month the state will begin to receive more testing kits and the weekly allocation will increase over time.
“These are swabs, viral transport medium, test tubes, and reagents, which is great news because these are the things that are hardest to get,” said Edwards.
The governor is in Washington D.C. on Wednesday for a one-on-one meeting with President Donald Trump. Testing will be one of the major topics.
Assistant Secretary for the state office of public health, Dr. Alex Billioux, says an increase in available tests would allow them to test asymptomatic people, especially in prisons and nursing homes, where vulnerable people live in close promxmity to each other.
“We think that there really is more and more evidence now that the asymptomatic testing is going to be helpful for those individuals,” said Billioux.
Edwards also addressed comments by New Orleans Mayor Latoya Cantrell who told reporters that there needs to be a discussion on chanceling Mardi Gras in 2021.
“I have declined to answer questions about what this fall is going to look like so I am certainly not going to go to next January and February and presume to know,” said Edwards.
Comments