A resident shows an at-home rapid COVID-19 test package in Philadelphia, Monday, Dec. 20, 2021AP Photo/Matt Rourke
The Biden administration is buying 500 million at-home COVID test kits to give Americans for free.
Americans can be ready to order test kits to be delivered to their properties beginning in January.
The administration can even require insurers to reimburse rapid test kits beginning in January.
The Biden administration is buying 500 million at dwelling, rapid COVID-19 exams to distribute to Americans for gratis in response to an increase in instances spurred partly by the extremely contagious Omicron variant, the White House introduced on Tuesday morning.
The emergence of Omicron colliding with the winter holidays created a pointy demand for COVID-19 testing that ran up towards a brief provide of at-home, over-the-counter exams, and insufficient infrastructure for in-person PCR testing.
Americans across the nation and in massive cities like New York have discovered pharmacies bought out of over-the-counter COVID-19 test kits and contended with hours-long strains to get a test.
In a Tuesday afternoon speech on the White House, President Joe Biden stated that his administration can even set up “emergency testing sites” in locations that want further capability.
“I don’t think anybody anticipated this was going to be as rapidly spreading as it did,” Biden stated concerning the Omicron variant.
Here’s what we find out about how and when Americans can get a free test package:
When can I get a free test?
The Biden administration will begin making test kits accessible for free at a yet-to-be-announced level in January. Eight totally different manufacturers of at-home rapid COVID exams are presently approved for use by the Food & Drug Administration.
“500 million tests in January is the largest order we have ever made to date, and we are going to do it as quickly as we can, but they won’t be available until January,” White House press secretary Jen Psaki stated in a Tuesday briefing.
Will the federal government mechanically ship free rapid test kits to all American households?
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No. Americans that desire a free test will want to order one. The administration will arrange web sites that may enable Americans to order a package to be shipped to their dwelling in some unspecified time in the future in January.
“We will have more information as it is available, including what the website looks like,” Psaki stated. “We will make the website available as soon as these tests are available.”
Can I get the price of a COVID-19 rapid test reimbursed by my insurance coverage within the meantime?
The brief reply for many of the 150 million Americans with non-public medical health insurance is: not but.
The Biden administration introduced in early December that they might additionally difficulty a mandate requiring non-public insurers to totally reimburse the prices of rapid, at-home COVID-19 test kits bought over-the-counter.
But the reimbursement requirement hasn’t gone into impact but — the White House has stated they will launch the precise particulars of the rule by January 15.
The reimbursement mandate additionally will not be retroactive for previous purchases, that means that the hundreds of thousands of Americans who shelled out cash to purchase rapid test kits in preparation for the vacations can have to shoulder these prices out of pocket.
One state, Vermont, has a state-level mandate requiring all insurers who function within the state to reimburse all over-the-counter.
But whereas most main non-public insurers cowl the prices of COVID-19 exams performed in a medical setting or at a test website, many insurers will solely reimburse over-the-counter COVID test kits that had been ordered by a physician.
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