Gov. Jared Polis defended his statewide mask mandate and discussed Colorado’s uptick in coronavirus cases in two network TV appearances Sunday morning, calling the national testing system a “complete disgrace.”
“So the national testing scene is a complete disgrace,” Polis said on NBC’s “Meet the Press.” He blamed national labs for the slow, multi-day turnaround for coronavirus testing results, saying that while labs in Colorado can return test results in one or two days, any tests sent to national labs take at least six days, and often longer.
“Unfortunately that takes a long time and we can’t count on it,” he said. “Our country needs to get testing right. We’re trying to build that capacity in Colorado to process tests with that one-to-two day turnaround.”
He added that the state currently can process about 2,000 to 3,000 tests per day. Colorado officials previously have blamed the surge in coronavirus infections in states including Texas, Arizona and Florida for bogging down private labs, including the one used to process tests performed at Denver’s Pepsi Center site.
Polis also appeared on ABC’s “This Week” on Sunday morning to discuss COVID-19 and Colorado’s mask mandate.
Watch both interviews below:
