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Fox News medical contributor and Johns Hopkins University professor of public health Dr. Marty Makary claimed Thursday that an obscure Food and Drug Administration (FDA) regulation delayed work on a potential antibody test for COVID-19 early in the onset of the contagion in the United States.

Makary told "Tucker Carlson Tonight" that researchers began creating antibody tests in January after the scientist who initially identified the COVID-19 strain published its genetic code in a medical journal.

"[The published genetic code] allowed anyone to run a basic genetic test with any body fluid from anybody suspected to have the infection from around the world and see if it matches," Makary explained. "And in fact that's what most of the world did."

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"But our FDA has a system where, using these old regulatory rules, it insisted on sanctioning the test," Makary continued. "And we lost precious time when one of the original scientists submitted an application and was told that he had to submit it also by paper mail with a CD-ROM with the files burned on it."

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Makary claimed that regulation stymied the process until the application was submitted in accordance with the rules.

"Thank God President Trump is cleaning house at the FDA right now," said Makary, who emphasized that large-scale antibody testing is a vital step to getting America back to a semblance of normal life.

"It's so embarrassing," host Tucker Carlson agreed. "The country that conquered polio can't get a test online."