State gets 70,000 swabs from FEMA

Delivery to improve testing, with another 130,000 on the way

As Connecticut prepares for a partial reopening of its economy on May 20, the Federal Emergency Management Agency has sent 70,000 swabs used in the most common type of COVID-19 test to help the state increase its testing capacity.

The agency will ship another 130,000 swabs and 150,000 transport media — materials to preserve test samples — to Connecticut between now and the end of June.

Governors across the country, including Connecticut’s Gov. Ned Lamont, have said that a shortage of swabs and other supplies have been a major impediment to ramping up COVID-19 testing in their states and reopening their respective economies. Lamont said Tuesday the state had signed contracts with Yale New Haven Health and Jackson Laboratories that would help further enhance its testing capability.

“There’s a strong sense that the commercial market will begin to catch up and create the capability such that (Connecticut) could begin to order swabs and reagents on their own beginning July 1,” said retired Coast Guard Capt. W. Russell “Russ” Webster, the administrator for FEMA Region 1, which covers New England. Reagents are chemicals used to analyze test samples.

The federal government also has provided personnel from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to assist Connecticut with testing and navigating the emergency use authorization granted by the Food and Drug Administration for various COVID-19 tests, Webster said.

Webster said FEMA also is working on a long-term recovery plan specific

to Connecticut. Hamden has been selected as the “prototype site” for the plan, which will then be rolled out statewide.

“We’re doing what’s called mission scoping there to determine in a more detailed sense, on a community level, how the federal government can support the economic and health-care-related needs of cities and towns in Connecticut,” he said.

A task force, which has been set up to develop the recovery plan, is looking at the myriad ways the pandemic is impacting communities, such as the “strong possibility” that 45% of child care businesses in Connecticut will not reopen and what federal programs may be able to help, Webster said.

FEMA has issued a major disaster declaration for all 50 states, enabling them to access federal funds to help fight coronavirus outbreaks. As of May 7, FEMA had obligated $25 million in federal support to Connecticut, and Webster said he expects “that amount to go up significantly as time goes forward.”

Webster said the coronavirus pandemic has presented challenges for FEMA that other disasters have not.

As opposed to being focused in a specific region or state, the pandemic is affecting the entire country. The agency is not immune to the disease; employees have contracted COVID-19 and have had to self-quarantine, and some have died.

While hurricanes or other major disasters generally play out over a few days or maybe a few weeks, the pandemic has been going on for months. As hurricane season approaches, the agency is rethinking its response in light of social distancing and other measures in place to help curb the spread of the coronavirus. One idea being tossed around, Webster said, is using field hospitals, which have been set up across states to treat overflow COVID-19 patients, as places where evacuees could be taken in the event of a hurricane.