Australia’s CCP Virus Testing Rate Best in World: PM Scott Morrison

Australian prime minister Scott Morrison, at Australia's Parliament House in Canberra, March 22, 2020. (David Gray/Getty Images)

Figures published this week from the Australian Department for Health show 10,000 tests per day for the CCP Virus have been carried out since March 22. That likely makes it the highest test rate in the world, says Prime Minister Scott Morrison.

Since the start of the outbreak to the morning of April 4, over 281,000 people across the country have been tested for CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus, commonly known as the coronavirus.

“Australia has now reached a testing rate of more than 1,000 tests per 100,000 population. ... We’re the first country, to the best of our knowledge, that has been able to exceed that mark,” said the prime minister at a press conference on April 2.

Earlier this month, World Health Organization Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus urged all countries to “test, test, test,” as a means to ease the spread of the CCP virus that has caused a global pandemic.

Since March 25, the Australian government has stepped up efforts to combat the spread of COVID-19 by implementing social-distancing and more pop-up testing clinics.

“We have mobilized a testing regime better than any in the world. We have put additional resources at record levels in our hospitals, into our private hospitals, into our aged care facilities,” said Morrison.

Australia was one of the first countries to identify the potential risk of the CCP virus and acted quickly by starting the process closing its borders to China on Feb. 1.

“Ten weeks ago, this week, ahead of the rest of the world, Australia listed the coronavirus as a disease with pandemic potential under our Biosecurity Act, following the outbreak of coronavirus in Wuhan, China,” he said.

This week’s official figures are showing signs that cases of people testing positive have steadily decreased. They’re now between 200-250 daily—a significant drop compared to a couple of weeks ago when that figure was 350-400 per day. Overall testing results show that just under two percent of people tested positive for COVID-19.

According to statistics from Oxford University’s Our World in Data, the United States leads the total number of tests with 1.2 million, followed by Germany at 918,000, and Italy in third with 581,000. Records are correct as of April 2.

Health Minister Greg Hunt identified regimented testing, contact tracing, social distancing, and self-isolation as key factors to overcome the spread of the CCP virus.