Federal government prepared to take lead in COVID testing, contact tracing

Prime Minister Trudeau says the federal government is ready and willing to  take a lead role in coordinating  COVID testing and contact tracing Trudeau says that the federal government is ready to make thousands of contact tracing calls a day, seven days a week.

Trudeau told reporters today that the federal government has trained federal employees who can make 3,600 contact tracing calls a day, and in addition, Statistics Canada has trained another 1,700 interviewers who can make up to 20,000 calls a day.

The federal government is offering this help to all the provinces and Trudeau said they are already helping Ontario by making some of their contact tracing calls.

Yesterday Trudeau and Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland held a conference call  were the discussion centered on the need to ramp up testing and contact tracing nationwide to improve the ability to identify cases and monitor the spread of the virus as lockdown measures ease.  

On average 28,000 people are tested daily nationwide. The federal government wants to see the number increase to 60,000. Less that 4 percent of Canadians have been tested so far.