As states begin to plan their reopenings after coronavirus lock-downs, some like Utah believe private-public partnerships with tech companies may be just the key they're looking for to ramp up testing.
The Beehive State has doubled its daily coronavirus testing capacity with a new testing website launched through a partnership with cloud-based software company Domo and other Silicon Slopes companies like Nomi Health, Qualtrics and Co-Diagnostics. Utah's Lieutenant Governor Spencer Cox and Domo CEO Josh James joined Cheddar to discuss their partnership.
"We recognized very early on that our way through this was going to be through a robust testing and tracing capacities, so we put all of our focus on that issue," said Lieutenant Governor Cox.
With the tech collaboration, Utah is now in the top five testing abilities per capita in the nation, and bottom five in mortality rate. Domo worked with the Utah government to increase access to testing equipment through their own supply chains and set up a website to streamline the process: Test Utah. There's also an app that tracks the testing data.
Privacy may be a concern for Utahns, but Domo CEO James explained, "Any data that comes in its just between you and the state and that's it. And when the state uses it, they can't even use it where it's personally identifiable. All they know is someone in this county tested positive... all information is encrypted and anonymized."
The program seems to be working, and other states are taking notice. There are now Test Iowa and Test Nebraska websites as well.
"We're fortunate here in Utah to have an incredible private sector business community that is very community minded thats always willing to step up and work with us," said Lieutenant Governor Cox.
Updated May 4 to clarify that Utah doubled its daily testing capacity through partnerships with Domo, as well as other Silicon Slopes companies including Nomi Health, Qualtrics and Co-Diagnostics.
A legislative package to end the government shutdown appears on track. A handful of Senate Democrats joined with Republicans to advance the bill after what's become a deepening disruption of federal programs and services. But hurdles remain. Senators are hopeful they can pass the package as soon as Monday and send it to the House. What’s in and out of the bipartisan deal has drawn criticism and leaves few senators fully satisfied. The legislation includes funding for SNAP food aid and other programs while ensuring backpay for furloughed federal workers. But it fails to fund expiring health care subsidies Democrats have been fighting for, pushing that debate off for a vote next month.
Sabrina Siddiqui, National Politics Reporter at The Wall Street Journal, joins to break down the SNAP funding delays and the human cost of the ongoing shutdown.
Arguments at the Supreme Court have concluded for the day as the justices consider President Donald Trump's sweeping unilateral tariffs in a trillion-dollar test of executive power.
President Donald Trump said he has decided to lower his combined tariff rates on imports of Chinese goods to 47% after talks with Chinese leader Xi Jinping on curbing fentanyl trafficking.
The Federal Reserve cut its key interest rate Wednesday for a second time this year as it seeks to shore up economic growth and hiring even as inflation stays elevated. The move comes amid a fraught time for the central bank, with hiring sluggish and yet inflation stuck above the Fed’s 2% target. Compounding its challenges, the central bank is navigating without much of the economic data it typically relies on from the government. The Fed has signaled it may reduce its key rate again in December but the data drought raises the uncertainty around its next moves. Fed Chair Jerome Powell told reporters that there were “strongly differing views” at the central bank's policy meeting about to proceed going forward.
