With more coronavirus cases being reported across the nation, U.S. Sen. Rick Scott, R-Fla., is calling for offering free tests for anyone experiencing symptoms.
Scott, who worked in the healthcare industry before running for governor in 2010 and the U.S. Senate in 2018, proposed the free tests on Tuesday.
“We are facing a public health crisis,” Scott said. “Nothing should get in the way of Americans’ ability to protect themselves and get tested for the Chinese coronavirus – especially cost. Anyone experiencing symptoms should be able to get a test for free, and I’m calling for Congress to include funding for the tests in the emergency supplemental appropriations bill and pass this funding now.”
Scott has been using the phrase “Chinese coronavirus” in recent days and has been very critical of how the communist regime leading that nation has handled the disease.
This week, Scott wrote a letter to the editor of the New York Times, hitting an op-ed from Xie Fang, insisting that he was giving the Chinese regime too much praise for how it handled coronavirus.
“Communist China cannot be trusted, and has not been honest about the coronavirus,” Scott wrote.
“Mr. Xie claims that China responded to the coronavirus outbreak in record time. Yet he conveniently doesn’t mention that when the virus first began to spread, the Chinese government did what it does best: silence critics and detain people accused of spreading rumors. It was his Communist Party that reprimanded and threatened a doctor in Wuhan for warning others about the initial outbreak; the same doctor later died from the disease,” Scott added
Reach Kevin Derby at kevin.derby@floridadaily.com.