The CDC is shipping monkeypox tests to five commercial labs, including some of the nation's largest, to quickly increase testing capacity and access, HHS said.
Those labs — Labcorp, Mayo Clinic Laboratories, Quest Diagnostics, Aegis Science and Sonic Healthcare — will dramatically expand testing capacity nationwide with the new supply of tests, according to a June 22 news release. Providers will be able to use them by early July, and the companies' testing capacity will be ramped up throughout the month.
"All Americans should be concerned about monkeypox cases," HHS Secretary Xavier Becerra said in the release. "Thankfully we have right now the tools to fight and treat cases in America. By dramatically expanding the number of testing locations throughout the country, we are making it possible for anyone who needs to be tested to do so.”
Public health experts had previously been concerned that the low number of tests was obscuring the true infection rates. Government labs were supplied to test 8,000 samples per week but were operating at only 2 percent capacity, accounting for about 23 tests per day.
There were 142 reported monkeypox cases across 24 states and Washington, D.C., as of June 21, according to the release.