Free COVID-19 tests by mail are coming back, federal health officials announced on Aug. 23.
The tests will be available at COVIDTests.gov starting in September. People can order four free tests that will be delivered using traditional mail.
Since 2021, the program has given out 1.8 million tests, and also provided access at some community clinics. This will be the seventh round of free tests it has made available.
Dawn O’Connell, assistant secretary for preparedness and response at the Department of Health and Human Services, said in an article on CIDRAP that people should order tests as the weather cools and as they begin to prepare for holiday travel — and use them.
“They do no good sitting in medicine cabinets,” O’Connell said.
The latest data from WastewaterSCAN, a national wastewater monitoring system, shows that SARS-CoV-2 remains high in all regions, though it’s gone down in the past three weeks in the Northeast, South and West.
Mandy Cohen, MD, director of the Centers for Disease Control, said the agency’s forecast for the upcoming season predicts similar or lower numbers of peak hospitalizations for COVID, flu, and respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) than last year. But that could change because SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, evolves faster than flu.
At a briefing on Aug. 23, Cohen discussed the federal government’s now-ended bridge access program, which gave COVID-19 vaccines to uninsured Americans. Cohen said the CDC has identified $62 million in funding for state and local health departments to receive the vaccine that may be able to be used this year.
Free access to the antiviral drug Paxlovid through a Pfizer program is available until the end of 2024 for uninsured people; Pfizer and Merck both have assistance programs for uninsured and underinsured people.
The news about the free tests comes as the US Food and Drug Administration approved emergency use authorization for updated mRNA COVID-19 vaccines the day before. The 2024-2025 formula includes a monovalent (single) component that corresponds to the omicron variant KP.2 strain of SARS-CoV-2. The shots are made by Moderna and Pfizer.
