OLYMPIA — Social distancing has been effective at slowing the onslaught of the novel coronavirus, the state's leader in the effort to fight it says. But resurrecting the state's economy will need to occur incrementally and with copious testing, retired Vice Adm. Raquel "Rocky" Bono cautions.

"It's not a question of if, but when novel coronavirus will resurge," said Bono, tapped by Gov. Jay Inslee to be Washington's director of COVID-19 health system response management. "A metered response predicated on a level of readiness ... has to be demonstrated."

Think of it as turning a dial rather than flipping a switch, she said in an exclusive interview with the Kitsap Sun, echoing a phrase Inslee has used.

That means testing — and lots of it. Bono said the state is on the cusp making coronavirus testing widely available. Currently, around 1,000 people a day are tested, but capacity has grown to 14,000 a day, she said. It will require a Herculean effort by state and local government and businesses to ensure Washingtonians returning to the public can be tested multiple times.

"It appears we're finally to the point where we have sufficient testing supplies," she said, noting the need will remain for the test's "consumables," or disposable materials like swabs and reagents for them.

The vice admiral, a former trauma surgeon in the Navy, has been living out of an Olympia hotel since being tapped by Inslee in late March to lead the state's effort against the virus. Currently a senior fellow at Johns Hopkins University's Applied Physics Laboratory, she's crisscrossed the state in the last month, working out of Seattle City Hall, Camp Murray at JBLM and at the capitol, among other places.

Washington state had reported 11,445 cases, including 135 in Kitsap, as of Saturday with a total of 603 deaths. Bono said she is pleased that early signs point to success in curbing infections thanks to social distancing and other protective measures ordered by Inslee.

"But I think there's a caution, shared widely, that we're not out of the woods yet," she said.

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And as elected leaders begin to advocate, to varying degrees, to reopen their industries for business, Bono stresses that caution. Even here in Kitsap, the county commissioners are advocating for construction activity to resume, albeit with "logical, scientifically-driven social distancing methods."

"The proposal of the building industry provides careful safeguards that will continue the state's recovery while allowing construction of the housing we dearly need," the commissioners said.

Bono has told business groups employers will need to be ready to do testing to isolate cases quickly. Community sites will be needed, too, and people will need to be tested multiple times as the virus doesn't always show itself one day to the next.

"It will be a combination of all those," she said.

"We have to have a reliable way of identifying those people who become infected and then be able to do the appropriate tracing to make sure that we identify who might have come in contact with them," she told an online Association of Washington Business forum earlier this week.

The 63-year-old Filipino American, who some are calling the "hospital czar," makes sure to get her cardio in, running stairwells and practicing conditioning she learned over the course of her decades in the Navy. Her family is scattered around North America.

Novel coronavirus' unique threat is twofold, she said: first, it is spread before its carrier knows it, and sometimes for the entire duration of the illness. And second, it is unknown to all human immune systems. She pointed to the Guam-sidelined USS Theodore Roosevelt, where reports say some 60% of those aboard who tested positive were unaware they had it.

Once her bag was packed, Bono hit the ground running with a three-stage plan to respond to the virus: first, protect health care workers on the front line; second, get the state the resources it would need to combat it, and third, keep the state's residents safe.

She's pushed for better data collection and even sent some 400 ventilators from the national strategic stockpile to another state once it appeared Washington would not need them. But she noted that the state must still be prepared to "surge" its hospital capacity if virus cases flare-up.

"I don't feel that we can let our guard down," she said.

Society has been irrevocably changed in some ways, she acknowledged. Cloth masks will help but they're not a replacement for physical distancing that will have to be a greater priority from now on. And the emphasis on handwashing and hygiene has to continue, too.

"I think handshakes are out," she said.

Reporter Josh Farley can be reached at josh.farley@kitsapsun.com.