WASHINGTON, D.C. — Following Senate passage of the Paycheck Protection Program and Health Care Enhancement Act, ACLA President Julie Khani released the following statement:

ACLA commends Congress for recognizing the need to substantially increase funding and support for testing in the most recent COVID-19 legislative package. This is an important step to provide states, federal agencies and the clinical laboratory community with the resources to further scale testing in response to the unprecedented need presented by the COVID-19 public health emergency.

Federal and state public health officials and business leaders across industries all agree that wide-scale molecular and serologic testing is vital to reopening the country and protecting the health of Americans. ACLA urges HHS to quickly provide clarity on how the funding will be allocated to support hotspots and high-risk populations, as well as broader efforts to increase high throughput testing nationwide. Continued support and funding for high throughput testing from commercial, hospital and academic laboratories is essential to achieve both of these goals.

ACLA is committed to working with Congress, the Administration and Governors to ensure that we can adequately expand America’s testing capacity, protect public health and support the reopening of our economy.

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ACLA is a not-for-profit association representing the nation’s leading clinical and anatomic pathology laboratories, including national, regional, specialty, hospital, ESRD and nursing home laboratories. The clinical laboratory industry employs nearly 295,000 people directly, and generates over 117,000 additional jobs in supplier industries. Clinical laboratories are at the forefront of personalized medicine, driving diagnostic innovation and contributing more than $106 billion to the nation’s economy.

Federal Funding Is Needed To Ensure Laboratories Can Scale High Throughput Testing For COVID-19

Washington, D.C. – The American Clinical Laboratory Association is encouraged by reports from Congressional leaders and the Administration regarding $25 billion in funding for COVID-19 testing. Moving forward, it is critical that any funding includes robust support for commercial laboratories performing and expanding COVID-19 testing, including high throughput tests that are required to achieve national scale. To expedite funding for expansion as quickly as possible, it’s recommended that federal funding route through HHS as opposed to individual states.

Improving testing capacity is one of the most critical steps that Congress and the Administration can take to protect Americans and restart the U.S. economy. Nearly every public health expert and economist agrees that a national testing infrastructure that supports high throughput testing must be in place to mitigate the spread of COVID-19. Yet, to date, no dedicated funding for laboratories has been made available to provide and increase nationwide COVID-19 testing that would assist in decisions to reopen the economy and allow Americans to return to work.

As policymakers work to provide funding for COVID-19 testing, it’s critically important that there is robust financial support for:

• Expanded access to high throughput, accurate and reliable testing and supplies, including swabs, personal protective equipment, reagents, testing kits, etc.;
• Equipment acquisition, including IT software, hardware and cybersecurity protection, to support nationwide testing capacity;
  Increased employee training and staffing;
• Full cost associated with serology testing as well as uncompensated and undercompensated care; and
• Robust coordination with state health agencies and federal authorities.

We appreciate the continued work of Congressional leaders in both the Senate and House who have released detailed plans in support of an expanded testing infrastructure. Congress must take immediate action to designate the funding necessary to ensure that all Americans have access to the high throughput, accurate and reliable testing that is needed.

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ACLA is a not-for-profit association representing the nation’s leading clinical and anatomic pathology laboratories, including national, regional, specialty, hospital, ESRD and nursing home laboratories. The clinical laboratory industry employs nearly 295,000 people directly, and generates over 117,000 additional jobs in supplier industries. Clinical laboratories are at the forefront of personalized medicine, driving diagnostic innovation and contributing more than $106 billion to the nation’s economy.

WASHINGTON, D.C. – Following the decision announced today by Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) to raise the Medicare reimbursement rate for high throughput COVID-19 molecular tests from about $51 to $100 dollars, ACLA President Julie Khani issued the following statement:

“In an acknowledgement of the considerable strain that has been placed on clinical laboratories supporting our nation’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic, the Administration today took decisive action to expand the availability of testing for patients nationwide.

As we’ve said from the beginning, this crisis demands the full force of the clinical laboratory industry—private, public, academic and hospital laboratories are all in this together. We know that the lack of predictable reimbursement for tests performed has been a barrier to entry for some laboratories, and today’s decision will help encourage all laboratories with the appropriate expertise to come to the table and perform COVID-19 testing. We also hope that other payers will follow CMS’s strong example of leadership today.

Following FDA guidance on February 29 that allowed commercial laboratories to test for COVID-19, ACLA members have performed more than two million tests, working around the clock to expand capacity without clear reimbursement guidelines or designated resources. At the same time, labs have been asked to do more with less. The cost of supplies has increased, and laboratories are seeing a substantial decline in non-COVID-19 testing, as patient visits to physicians plummet and elective surgeries, screenings and routine care services are postponed.

After scaling up to meet an unprecedented demand for testing, ACLA members have now eliminated testing backlogs and have considerable capacity that is not in use. We stand ready to perform more testing and are in close communication with public health partners about ways we can support additional needs.”