Frustrated by Lack of Coronavirus Tests, Maryland Got 500,000 From South Korea.

'Facing shortages, Gov. Larry Hogan and his wife, Yumi Hogan, negotiated with suppliers in South Korea to obtain the kits. “It should not have been this difficult,” he said.

When President Trump told governors that they needed to step up their efforts to secure medical supplies, Gov. Larry Hogan of Maryland took the entreaty seriously and negotiated with suppliers in South Korea to obtain coronavirus test kits.

“The No. 1 problem facing us is lack of testing,” said Mr. Hogan, a Republican, who has been among the many critics of the Trump administration’s repeated claims that states have adequate testing provided by the federal government. “We can’t open up our states without ramping up testing.”

In recent days, his wife, Yumi Hogan, a Korean immigrant who speaks fluent Korean, had been on the phone in the middle of the night helping to secure the final deal with two labs to sell Maryland the tests.

“Luckily we had a very strong relationship with Korea,” Mr. Hogan said. “But it should not have been this difficult.”

On Saturday, a Korean Air flight arrived at Baltimore-Washington International Airport carrying 5,000 test kits, which officials said would give the state the ability to make 500,000 new tests. The Food and Drug Administration and other agencies gave their seal of approval for the kits as the plane was landing.

“I was frosted because my team was saying that the F.D.A. approval was going to hold it up,” Mr. Hogan said in a telephone interview. “I didn’t care and was going to get the tests anyway.”

So far, Maryland has conducted 71,577 tests for the virus, and nearly 14,000 infections have been recorded, a number that continues to rise. More than 500 people have died in the state.

A number of South Korean vendors were considered for the new test kits, and ultimately the state went with LabGenomics.'>>>

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/20/us/politics/larry-hogan-wife-yumi-korea-coronavirus-tests.html?