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Taiwan’s vice president Chen Chien-jen claimed in a May 8 interview with France24 (around 3:40) that they cannot find the official number of Covid-19 tests performed in China... the implication being obviously that such [official] numbers aren't easily available or even published by China.

(Note that he is not talking about the number of cases reported but rather the number of tests performed; that number is also important in a number of ways e.g. relative to the number of cases found.)

So, is that true basically, has China not officially (and conspicuously) published the number of Covid-19 tests it has performed?

Laurel
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Fizz
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    One needs to keep in mind that reports of US testing are, um, incredible: [Public labs have done 819 thousand tests](https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/cases-updates/testing-in-us.html). [Trump says US will pass 10 million coronavirus tests this week](https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2020/05/11/coronavirus-trump-says-us-pass-10-million-tests-states-get-11-billion/3111814001/). – Daniel R Hicks May 12 '20 at 17:05
  • @DanielRHicks - I don't think 10 million tests is that incredible. Even assuming that every test was on a different person (and given that the White House staff has been [repeatedly tested](https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/05/12/us/coronavirus-testing-white-house.html), that distribution seems unlikely), that's still a 3% testing rate - which is [definitely not enough](https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2020/04/22/840526338/is-the-u-s-testing-enough-for-covid-19-as-debate-rages-on-heres-how-to-know). – jdunlop May 12 '20 at 23:03
  • @jdunlop - Think about it -- "in-credible". – Daniel R Hicks May 12 '20 at 23:38
  • @DanielRHicks I know, I was treating the word by its original definition. But I think 10 million tests is a credible figure. Whether those tests are good, or well-distributed, or consistently applied are obviously confounding factors, but I'd view "we've administered ten million tests" as a credible assertion at this point. – jdunlop May 12 '20 at 23:42
  • @jdunlop - 10 million tests would be good. But there's no way that number have been done in the US. If you believe Trump's claim that that many tests have been done I have some beachfront property in the Mohave Desert to sell you. – Daniel R Hicks May 12 '20 at 23:51
  • @DanielRHicks - I don't think it's that unreasonable. Since mid-April, the average tests-per-day has been more than two hundred thousand. If the total throughout the pandemic isn't at ten million, it's probably close. The problem is that the _low_ bound of "how many should be done" is in the range of a million tests _per day_, which makes the ten million claim by Trump like someone saying "I won the marathon!" having run two blocks. – jdunlop May 13 '20 at 00:37

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OurWorldInData includes China on a long list of countries for which it could not find official data for testing performed. They note as of 05 May 2020:

we are not aware of any figures relating to the whole of China. There is some data relating to parts of China, for instance press releases concerning testing in Guangdong province.

Brian Z
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