Credibility Crisis: Dem Senator Calls Random Sample Testing “Ridiculous,” but Joe Biden’s Own Advisers Recommended It

Sen. Marcus: GOP-recommended random sample testing is “ridiculous, unhelpful, unworkable”

Joe Biden’s Health Adviser: “We need to do random testing of people”

Raleigh, N.C. — Democratic N.C. Senator Natasha Marcus launched a politically-charged broadside against Republican Senate Leader Phil Berger, calling his requests for random sample testing “ridiculous, unhelpful, and unworkable.”

If Sen. Marcus’s conclusion is based on facts instead of political fearmongering, then certainly she opposes the recommendation from Ezekiel J. Emanuel, M.D., who is the chairman of the department of medical ethics and health policy at the University of Pennsylvania and serves on former Vice President Joe Biden’s public health advisory committee addressing the coronavirus outbreak.

He wrote, “We need a [serological] survey of multiple communities. Such studies test blood samples from randomly chosen individuals in a defined population…That means we need to do random testing of people.”

Senator Jim Perry (R-Lenoir) said, “Wanting the appropriate people to have the appropriate tools to make good decisions is about as apolitical a position there can be. How anybody could oppose more data, and think that it’s ‘unhelpful,’ is just mindboggling.”

The fact is, experts from Stanford and Harvard have been pushing for random sample testing for many weeks to estimate how many people have the virus and, just as importantly, how many people had the virus.

Such a study would show the true prevalence of the virus in the community, which would provide reliable estimates of the true hospitalization and fatality rates.

The News & Observer editorial board endorsed the concept weeks ago.

Presidential candidate Joe Biden’s top advisers are pushing the concept, too.

Sen. Marcus appears to be basing her conclusion on political fearmongering rather than expert advice.

Does her opinion change if the recommendations are coming from Democrats instead of Republicans?