CNN contributor Dr. Sanjay Gupta claimed without evidence on Monday night that the Trump administration deliberately minimized the COVID-19 pandemic “by not testing,” despite the fact that Johns Hopkins University & Medicine says the “U.S. has conducted more COVID-19 tests than any other country.”
“Look at the U.K. We’ll discuss it later in the show with [inaudible] from Harvard who is taking a look at it. How do they get these rapid tests?” CNN host Chris Cuomo said. “How are they getting it done in 90 minutes? Is the U.K. so much better than us? Is there some science that’s proprietary? I mean, couldn’t we be buying up those kinds of tests right now, doc?”
“We should have been developing this ourselves, Chris. And you talked about this early on, there was a strategic, I think, method to minimizing this by not testing,” Gupta claimed. “Sad to say, but I think that’s the truth now, you sort of suggested that early on and I thought, maybe we’re just behind. But I think it was deliberate now at this point to not test, because it would make things look bad, we should have had significant breakthroughs in antigen testing by now.”
“It should be easy to know what your day is going to be like for the coronavirus as it would be looking at your phone for the weather,” Gupta added. “Do I have it? Do people around me have it? What’s the weather look like? What’s the coronavirus look like?”
WATCH:
Get out your tinfoil hats! CNN's political doctor, Dr. Sanjay Gupta dives into conspiracy theories, claims the administration intentionally withheld COVID testing. "I think that's the truth now."
Meanwhile, the health care experts on the Task Force say no such order was given. pic.twitter.com/qQskT4eZZx— Nicholas Fondacaro (@NickFondacaro) August 4, 2020
TRANSCRIPT OF THE VIDEO CLIP:
CNN HOST CHRIS CUOMO: Look at the U.K. We’ll discuss it later in the show with [inaudible] from Harvard who is taking a look at it. How do they get these rapid tests? How are they getting it done in 90 minutes? Is the U.K. so much better than us? Is there some science that’s proprietary? I mean, couldn’t we be buying up those kinds of tests right now, doc?
CNN CONTRIBUTOR DR. SANJAY GUPTA: We should have been developing this ourselves, Chris. And you talked about this early on, there was a strategic, I think, method to minimizing this by not testing. Sad to say, but I think that’s the truth now, you sort of suggested that early on and I thought, maybe we’re just behind. But I think it was deliberate now at this point to not test, because it would make things look bad, we should have had significant breakthroughs in antigen testing by now. It should be easy to know what your day is going to be like for the coronavirus as it would be looking at your phone for the weather. Do I have it? Do people around me have it? What’s the weather look like? What’s the coronavirus look like?
CUOMO: But do we have it even created, doc? Can’t we get it from somewhere else? Where did the U.K. Get it?
GUPTA: So that was another thing, you know, the initial test that was available, that we did not use, was a world health organization test. There was this idea that we will create our own test.
CUOMO: But then we pulled out of that.
