What we know about delays in coronavirus testing

Reports of a respiratory virus spreading in Wuhan, China, emerged in late 2019. After the number of cases outside China increased rapidly, the World Health Organization declared the novel coronavirus a pandemic on March 11.

With no cure or vaccine currently available, diagnostic testing is crucial to containing the spread of the virus.

Opportunities to mitigate the pandemic’s impact in the United States were lost amid bureaucratic delays and a breakdown in efforts to produce a reliable test kit at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

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