Testing becomes a flash point in the Senate hearing.
Senators at the hearing on Tuesday emphasized the importance of ramping up testing, as the Trump administration said it was preparing to provide states with supplies for millions of tests.
Mr. Alexander described a future vaccine or treatment as the ?ultimate solution,? but he said ?until we have them, all roads back to work and school go through testing. The more tests we conduct, the better we can identify those who are sick and exposed.?
Admiral Giroir, who is overseeing the government?s testing response, testified that the administration was planning to send to states enough swabs for 12.9 million tests over the next four weeks. By September, the country will have the ability to conduct 40 million to 50 million tests per month, he said.
He also pointed to new technologies, such as a recently approved antigen test, that could further increase capacity. But his remarks drew skepticism from Democratic senators, including Senator Patty Murray of Washington, the committee?s top Democrat.
?This administration has had a record of bringing us broken promises that more supplies and testing are coming, and they don?t,? she said. ?And we know that testing needs will persist long past June, long past.?
Testing in the United States has been steadily increasing, with nearly 400,000 tests processed on Monday, a daily record, according to The Covid Tracking Project. But that is still not at the level that many public health experts say will be needed to safely reopen society. Some experts have said that two million to three million people per day must be tested in order to quickly identify hot spots and get the virus under control.
The availability of supplies has improved in recent weeks, and many testing sites are no longer experiencing shortages. But shipping millions of swabs to states does not guarantee that they will immediately begin to scale up testing. Other bottlenecks have also limited the number of tests that can be done, including having enough workers to take samples from patients and enough protective equipment to keep workers safe.
A coalition of public health organizations sent a letter to Congress on Monday asking for at least $7.6 billion to increase the contact tracing work force in the United States. The organizations say they need at least 100,000 additional contact tracers, 10,000 supervisors, and 1,600 epidemiologists to rapidly build contact tracing capacity.
Dr. Redfield said that the outbreak ?went beyond the capacity? of the government?s contact tracing program, telling senators, ?we lost containment.?
He said the C.D.C. had reprogrammed 500 people nationwide to help build up the contact-tracing capacity the states would need to prepare for the fall and winter.
Senator Richard Burr, Republican of North Carolina, complained that the C.D.C. had been slow to build surveillance tracking abilities for many infectious diseases despite huge sums of money that Congress has provided for the purpose. ?I?m hopeful we won?t just talk about surveillance,? Mr. Burr said. ?We?ll actually execute it.?
Dr. Redfield said a national surveillance system for the virus was being developed with a special focus on nursing homes, where a third of the nation?s deaths have taken place. Facilities must report all infections in both residents and staff members to the public health authorities and notify family members there are cases, Dr. Redfield said. He was uncertain about the timing of carrying out the guidelines, however, saying, ?I?m pretty confident it?s operational, but I need to double check just to make sure.?
