Dr. Leana Wen: We Need National COVID Policy, Faster Testing

It’s the Midday Healthwatch with Dr. Leana Wen, the former health commissioner of the City of Baltimore. She writes about public health issues as a columnist for The Washington Post, and she teaches public health policy at George Washington University. More than 4.2 million people have been infected with the Coronavirus in the United States. Worldwide, that number is more than 16 million. About 650,000 people around the globe have died of Coronavirus-related disease. Here in Maryland, more than 3,400 people have died due to virus-related illness. Last month, our state was one of 12 states in which the number of new cases was decreasing. That’s no longer the case. The number of people who test positive for COVID-19 in Maryland remains at just above 5%, which means that Maryland is one of the 34 states in the U.S. above the positivity rate recommended by the World Health Organization.Email us at [email protected], tweet us: @MiddayWYPR, or call us at 410-662-8780.