Appearing on Sunday’s edition of CBS’s Face the Nation, former commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), Scott Gottlieb, MD, was asked to identify the rate of positive COVID-19 tests in a particular area that would present an issue for schools trying to reopen. “I think somewhere in five to 10 [percent] it’s starting to get iffy,” Gottlieb said on the July 26 airing of the show. “Above 10 [percent] I think that’s a threshold where you really want to think carefully about closing the school districts, because that is a sign that there is an epidemic underway inside that community.“ae0fcc31ae342fd3a1346ebb1f342fcb Gottlieb expanded on the subject, telling the show’s moderator Margaret Brennan that testing itself had to be improved and streamlined significantly before schools can reopen safely. “I think one of the things you need to look at in a local community is whether or not you can get test results, because if you can’t get test results back in a timely fashion, you really don’t have a way to detect whether there is an outbreak in the community or in the school,” Gottlieb said. “And while we do need to lean forward and try to open our schools because it’s important to children, we need to prevent outbreaks from happening in the schools. We can’t just let the infection run rampant inside the schools. And having good testing in place is going to be a critical tool.” RELATED: For more up-to-date information, sign up for our daily newsletter. While Gottlieb named testing company LabCorp as an example of being caught up from its backlog of tests, claiming they will now be able to return results within two or three days, there is clearly a problem with the overall system. Many people still aren’t seeing their lab results for two weeks or even longer. And for those looking to find out if their local schools are opening in the weeks ahead, they’ll have to do the same thing: wait. And for more on the development of a coronavirus immunity shot, check out We Are This Close to a Vaccine, According to Doctor Leading the Search.
