Ryan Nicol
Gov. Ron DeSantis is continuing efforts to ramp up testing in South Florida, announcing an increase in testing supplies for Broward and Miami-Dade counties and an additional testing site in Palm Beach County.
The National Guard will be involved in helping oversee that site in Palm Beach. That will mirror efforts in Broward, where the National Guard set up a drive-through testing location at CB Smith Park in Pembroke Pines.
“One of our main priorities has been to expand testing in the state of Florida,” DeSantis said during a Friday news conference.
“If you look at our numbers, you’re now seeing many, many more tests than were done just a week-and-a-half ago.”
DeSantis elaborated on that point, outlining the state’s efforts to supplement testing efforts organized at the local level.
“Just from the sites that we’ve helped stand up — the Broward site, some of the sites in Miami-Dade, Jacksonville, Orange County — you’ve done close to 10,000 tests just on those sites that the state of Florida was leading on. And we’ve seen many more thousands done throughout the state of Florida.”
As of a Friday morning update, Miami-Dade continued to lead the state with 763 confirmed cases. Broward — which is one county north of Miami-Dade — was in second with 614. The next county north, Palm Beach County, was in third with 194 confirmed positives.
DeSantis noticed Palm Beach was a distant third, but also questioned whether the number of confirmed tests accurately reflected the spread relative to Miami-Dade and Broward.
“If you look at Palm Beach’s numbers, they have not had nearly the amount of testing that Dade and Broward have had,” DeSantis noted.
“I think it’s important to expand the testing there so that we can get a better sense of what’s going on.”
Paradoxically, DeSantis has also begun hinting at a rollback on statewide efforts to close schools and set up social distancing measures due to the lack of positive tests in some parts of the state.
Critics who warn DeSantis may be making a mistake often use his stated logic regarding Palm Beach. That is, it’s unclear how confident officials can be regarding the lack of spread in other parts of the state given they have continued to lag in testing.
DeSantis said an announcement would be forthcoming on the exact location and start date for the new Palm Beach testing site. He said state is working with Palm Beach County to make those determinations.
As for Broward and Miami-Dade, DeSantis said both counties would be receiving an additional 1,000 swabs to be used for testing. Hillsborough County — which placed fourth in confirmed cases as of Friday morning — will also receive 1,000 swabs.
“All of this stuff is in such short supply around the world and around our country, but particularly involving these collection swabs to take the samples,” DeSantis said.
DeSantis has repeatedly acknowledged that despite President Donald Trump’s repeated assertions that anyone who wants a test can have one, states and hospitals and testing sites still do not have a sufficient number of supplies weeks into the outbreak.
But the Governor said those swabs are being shipped out as soon as they are received as the state seeks to avoid the fate of New York, which accounts for about half the cases in the entire country.
