Donald Trump falsely says WHO coronavirus test 'was a bad test'

A persistent but inaccurate talking point is that the United States turned down coronavirus testing kits from the World Health Organization. We found that WHO never offered kits to the United States, and when a reporter asked President Donald Trump if that was true, he confirmed, and took it a step further.

"No. 1, nothing was offered," Trump said March 17. "No. 2, it was a bad test."

There is zero evidence that the WHO’s preferred test is unreliable.

Based on a test developed in Berlin, Germany, by the end of February, WHO had purchased and sent materials to over 100 countries for 1.4 million tests.

A review from the National University of Singapore reported that the German test gave neither false positives, nor false negatives. In technical terms, it was "highly sensitive and specific," and did not "cross-react with other coronaviruses."

Before Trump spoke, top officials explained that the United States wanted a test that came through American commercial vendors and had been approved by the Food and Drug Administration.

The head of the U.S. Public Health Service, Adm. Brett Giroir, said the WHO protocol had not been submitted to the FDA. 

The head of the White House coronavirus response, Deborah Birx, said that a few months from now, the public would see that other tests used around the world were not as good as the U.S. one. We asked the White House press office if Birx was talking about the WHO test and got no comment.

Featured Fact-check

Lou Dobbs

stated on March 2, 2020 in a TV interview

The United States is “actually screening fewer people (for the coronavirus than other countries) because we don't have appropriate testing."

Trump said that the coronavirus test used by WHO "was a bad test."

In the lab, the test was found to produce neither false positives nor negatives.

The White House produced no evidence that the test under-performed.

We rate this claim False.