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PUBLIC LIFE TO TRY AND STOP THE VIRUS FROM SPREADING. SHELLY: AS CASES IN OUR STATE CLIMB, MORE PEOPLE ARE ANXIOUS TO FIND OUT IF THEY HAVE CORONAVIRUS. DOUG: BUT AS TARGET 7 DISCOVERED, THAT ANXIETY COULD LAST AS LONG AS A WEEK FOR SOME OF YOU. >> LONG LINES FILING INTO COVID-19 TESTING SITES. A SCENE FAMILIAR TO ERIC HERN . MORE THAN A WEEK AGO, HE AND HIS FAMILY WERE RIGHT HERE. DARKER THE ONLY ELECTED TO TEST ONE OF US, WHICH WAS ME BECAUSE OF THE SHORTAGE AND TESTING SUPPLIES. >> IT TOOK SEVEN DAYS TO FIND OUT HE IS NOT AFFECTED. >> I THOUGHT IT WAS A PUBLIC EMERGENCY. I EXPECTED A FEW DAYS AT THE MOST. MADE ME WONDER WHO ELSE IS STILL WAITING TO BE TESTED. >> THERE IS A BACKLOG OF SAMPLES NOW, THE GOVERNOR IS POINTING FINGERS AT THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT. LAST NIGHT SHE SPOKE TO MSNBC , SAYING THE LABS IN NEW MEXICO DON’T HAVE ENOUGH MATERIALS TO ACTUALLY TEST THE SAMPLES. SHE ALSO SAYS THE STATE IS HAVING PROBLEMS GETTING FDA APPROVAL ON THE MACHINES CAPABLE OF TESTING THEM. >> IT’S BECOME A FULL TIME JOB WORKING EITHER AROUND OR DIRECTLY THROUGH THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT. >> THE GOVERNOR SAYS IF GIVEN THE RESOURCES THE STATE COULD TEST AS MANY AS 6,000 SAMPLES A DAY. AFTER ONLY ONE WEEK OF TESTING, 5400 SAMPLES HAVE BEEN PROCESSED. >> WE COULD BE TESTING MORE THIS POINT. >> DOCTOR JASON MITCHELL IS THE CHIEF MEDIAL OFFICER AT PRESBYTERIAN HOSPITAL WHICH HAS BEEN COLLECTING SAMPLES FROM POSSIBLE PATIENTS. >> THE TESTS HAVE TO BE ACCURATE OR IT COULD LEAD US IN THE WRONG DIRECTION AND AND CAUSE A LOT OF PROBLEMS IN HEALTH CARE. WE ARE HAPPY THE TESTS ARE EFFECTIVE AND WE ARE HAPPY THEY ARE ACCURATE AND WE WILL BE REAL -- REALLY HAPPY WHEN WE CAN DO A LOT MORE OF THEM EVERYDAY. DOUG: TARGET 7 REACHED OUT TO TRI-CORE LABS. THEY TELL US AS OF YESTERDAY THEY HAVE INCREASED THEIR ABILITY TO TEST SAMPLES FROM 300 TODAY TO

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Some New Mexicans are waiting as long as a week to find out if they have the coronavirus.Just ask Eric Hern who had symptoms and took his entire family to a drive thru test site and never got a phone call. After he called asking around, he found out he didn’t have COVID-19 seven days after he took the test.“I thought it was a public emergency. So, I was expecting a few days at the most,” Hern said. “It made me wonder who else is waiting to be tested.”There are more.Local officials have acknowledged there is a backlog that’s taking as long as five days. They won’t say exactly how many are waiting in queue to be tested by one of two labs in the state. Meanwhile, more tests samples are being collected at as many as four different sites in Metropolitan Albuquerque.Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham pointed fingers at the federal government Monday night in an appearance on MSNBC.“Here is the challenge -- getting the materials and getting the FDA approval fast enough on each of those instruments,” she said on live television. “They have made it incredibly complicated to access the swabbing at the front end and the reagents at the back end….It's become a full-time job working either around or directly through the federal government.”State officials said Tuesday they have been working around the clock to reduce the backlog at the state lab and they are down to a 24-hour turn around time. There are two labs that are conducting the tests. A second private lab tells Target 7 their turnaround time is five days. A spokesman said the governor wants to test everyone who has symptoms but can’t.While speaking on cable news, Lujan Grisham said the state has the capability to test as many as 6,000 samples a day for COVID-19. In the first two weeks they started testing, only 5,400 samples were tested.A spokeswoman for Tricore, the privately-owned lab that is also conducting tests, said the lab has increased it’s capacity from 300 samples a day to 1,000. “As we work through the backlog, our focus is on hospitalized patients, persons under investigation by the Department of Health, and first responders. This prioritization is reflected in our testing algorithms,” Beth Bailey, a Tricore spokeswoman, wrote in an email. “We are actively exploring additional testing platforms that would increase capacity for the state. Our strategy is to use multiple methods to meet the capacity needs and to be able to maintain testing during potential reagent shortages by any one manufacturer.”Doctors on the front line said they want to test more, but it is important to have FDA approval.“It is really important that when we run a test that we know they are accurate so there is a due diligence that the government has to do and labs have to do to insure that all of those tests that we run on New Mexicans are accurate,” said Dr. Jason Mitchell, chief medical officer for Presbyterian Hospital, which is running one of the drive thru testing locations. “We are happy the tests are effective, and we are happy they are accurate and we will be real happy when we can do a lot more of them every day.”In those days he waited, Hern said he self-isolated and only went out once to get groceries. He said his family still have the symptoms and believe they have a cold and not COVID-19.“It would definitely serve everybody a lot better to know right away,” Hern said. “That way you know what you need to be doing."