Trump declared a national emergency on Friday and also boated that the US government’s coronavirus testing apparatus, which has poorly lagged behind other developed nations, would soon get an assist from Google.
Trump claimed in his address that the search and advertising giant would create a website that would help Americans figure out if they need a test for the virus, and if so, where they can go to be tested.
According to Wired, the announcement sounded like a great stride in the efforts to improve America’s response to COVID-19, there is one small problem- Google had no idea that Trump was going to mention a site like the one he described because no such site exists.
A source at Google told WIRED that the company leadership was surprised that Trump announced anything about the initiative at the press conference.
The source also revealed that what Trump did say was also almost entirely wrong. There will be a coronavirus testing site, not from Google, but from Alphabet sister company “Verily.” Which the company did confirm in a tweeted statement. “We are developing a tool to help triage individuals for Covid-19 testing,” they said.
“Verily is in the early stages of development, and planning to roll testing out in the Bay Area, with the hope of expanding more broadly over time.”
Sources told the Verge that the original idea of this site was for it to be used by health care officials only.
Now thanks to Trump’s “surprise” announcement the Verily has decided to open their site to the public to view it, but can still only provide people with testing site information in the San Francisco area.
A spokesperson for Verily, characterized the intention of the site differently from the Verge’s report. “We were initially planning to focus on highest risk populations, which includes healthcare workers—but this was not solely intended for them,” the company said. “We are collaborating with organizations like Quest Diagnostics and Labcorp as part of this initiative, and local organizations to determine what will work best. At Verily, we are focused on developing a tool to help triage individuals for testing.”
