https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2020/03/coronavirus-testing-numbers/607714/

“I have no clue if we could have already or could be now spreading this to others,” one patient told us.

ROBINSON MEYER ALEXIS C. MADRIGAL

8:09 PM ET

Nearly two weeks after the new coronavirus was first found to be spreading among Americans, the United States remains dangerously limited in its capacity to test people for the illness, an ongoing investigation from The Atlantic has found.

After surveying of local data from across the country, we can only verify that 4,384 people have been tested for the coronavirus nationwide, as of today at 4 p.m. eastern. These data are as comprehensive a compilation of official statistics as currently possible.

The lack of testing means that it is almost impossible to know how many Americans are infected with the coronavirus and suffering from COVID-19, the disease it causes. While our analysis has tracked state and local announcements that more than 570 people in 36 states are infected, experts say that number is almost certainly too small to reflect the full extent of the disease’s spread in the U.S. Not enough Americans have been tested for officials to know how many people are ill, they say.

When researchers have used statistical and genetic techniques to estimate the true size of the outbreak, they have concluded that thousands of Americans may have already been infected by the beginning of the month. Health officials have attributed 26 deaths to COVID-19 in the United States, as of today.

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