Assistant Secretary for Health Admiral Brett Giroir speaks during a news conference in the Rose Garden of the White House in Washington, on April 27. Mandel Ngan/AFP/Getty Images

Admiral Brett Giroir, director of US coronavirus testing, said the federal government will continue to help states procure supplies for testing, despite new guidelines that describe it as a “supplier of last resort” in obtaining tests.

“It’s very important that I think we don’t interrupt our commercial channels, because they’re very efficient and this is what they do, but we do have to prioritize them,” Giroir told reporters at the White House on Monday.

“Some of the larger companies, the testing companies, we need to make sure that the states that have a certain machine or a certain test are adequately supplied until we get 10 times the amount that we need," he added.

Giroir described supplies like swabs as a “small, fragile ecosystem right now.”

“For the next couple of months, we’re going to procure them at the federal level to make sure they’re distributed to the states,” he said, “but towards the middle or the end of the summer that supply chain will be very robust.”

Starting as early as late next week, Giroir said, “for say, swabs and media, we know what the plan is.

"We’re going to be sending the states what they need every week without them asking,” he said.