Biden to pledge 500M free COVID-19 tests to counter omicron

With the omicron variant on the march, President Joe Biden plans to announce 500 million free rapid tests for Americans, increased support for hospitals under strain and a redoubling of vaccination and boosting efforts.

In a speech scheduled for Tuesday afternoon, Biden is detailing major changes to his COVID-19 winter plan, his hand forced by the arrival of the fast-spreading variant, whose properties are yet not fully understood by scientists.

The world is confronting a second straight COVID-19 holiday season as families and friends begin to gather. Scientists don't yet know for sure how serious the disease caused by omicron can usually be, but they do know that vaccination should offer strong protections against severe illness and death.

The White House provided details on the proposals Biden will announce in his speech.

A cornerstone of the plan is Biden's decision for the government to purchase 500 million coronavirus rapid tests for free shipment to Americans starting in January. People will use a new website to order their tests, which will then be sent by US mail at no charge, the White House said.

It marks a major shift for Biden, who earlier had called for many Americans to purchase the hard-to-find tests on their own and then seek reimbursement from their health insurance. For the first time, the US government will send free COVID-19 tests directly to Americans, after more than a year of urging by public health experts.

Experts had criticized Biden's initial buy-first, get-paid-later approach as unwieldy and warned that the US would face another round of problems with testing at a critical time. Testing advocates point to places like the UK and Germany, which have distributed billions of tests to the public and recommend people test themselves twice a week.

The federal government will also establish new testing sites and use the Defense Production Act to help manufacture more tests. The first new federally supported testing site will open in New York this week. The new testing sites will add to 20,000 already available. White House officials said they're working with Google so that people will be able to find them by searching free COVID test near me.

Still, Biden's testing surge would fall far short of the levels needed for all Americans to test at the recommended rate of twice weekly.

The US would need 2.3 billion tests per month for everyone 12 and older to do that, according to the nonprofit Kaiser Family Foundation. That's nearly five times the half-billion tests Biden will deploy.

Currently, the US can conduct about 600 million tests per month, with home tests accounting for about half, according to researchers from Arizona State University.

In another prong to Biden's amped-up plan, he is prepared to deploy an additional 1,000 troops with medical skills to assist hospitals buckling under the virus surge. Additionally, he is immediately sending federal medical personnel to Michigan, Indiana, Wisconsin, Arizona, New Hampshire and Vermont. There are also plans to ready additional ventilators and protective equipment from the national stockpile, expanding hospital resources.

As a backstop, the Federal Emergency Management Agency will deploy hundreds of ambulances and paramedic teams so that if one hospital fills up, they can transport patients to open beds in other facilities. Ambulances are already headed to New York and Maine, and paramedic teams are going to New Hampshire, Vermont and Arizona.

But vaccination remains the main defense, since it can head off disease in the first place. The government will support multiple vaccination sites and provide hundreds of personnel to administer shots. New rules will make it easier for pharmacists to work across state lines to administer a broader range of shots.

For those who are already fully vaccinated, booster shots have been shown in lab tests to provide strong protection against omicron.

Although reports of breakthrough cases abound, data show that vaccinated people who become infected are much less likely to suffer serious disease leading to hospitalisation or death.

To the unvaccinated, Biden plans to deliver a stern admonition that they're risking their lives and the lives of their loved ones.

In a preview of Biden's speech, White House press secretary Jen Psaki said at Monday's press briefing that the Democratic president doesn't plan to impose any lockdowns and will instead be encouraging people to get vaccinated and, if they're eligible, to get their booster shots.

Some prominent experts said that Biden's plan is a step in the right direction but the president hasn't gone far enough to try to get ahead of the virus, given the risks of infections and hospitals being overwhelmed.

I don't know that the measures being proposed are going to be adequate, said Dr. Peter Hotez, dean of the National School of Tropical Medicine at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston.

Hotez said the government may need go a step further by authorizing a second booster shot for health care workers to prevent infections that would sideline clinicians when all hands are needed.

Dr. Eric Topol, professor of molecular medicine at Scripps Research in La Jolla, California, said the administration finally sees the light on testing with Biden's plan to ship 500 million tests, but the type of test being provided is important at a time when the disease can spread quickly.

We don't have control of this pandemic here, said Topol. We need to pull out all the stops, and we're not doing that still.

Topol said the government could redefine fully vaccinated as three shots instead of two of the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines, Biden could order the Federal Aviation Administration to bar air travel by people who are not fully vaccinated, and the government could use its authority to ramp up production of high quality masks for free distribution.

There's a lack of boldness, Topol said. I am disappointed.

Scientists say omicron spreads even more easily than other coronavirus strains, including delta. It accounted for nearly three-quarters of new U.S. infections last week.

Underscoring the reach of the virus, the White House said late Monday that Biden had been in close contact with a staff member who later tested positive for COVID-19. The staffer spent about 30 minutes around the president on Air Force One on Friday. The staffer, who was fully vaccinated and boosted, tested positive Monday, Psaki said.

Psaki said Biden has tested negative twice since Sunday and will test again on Wednesday. Citing guidance from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Psaki said Biden didn't need to quarantine and would continue with his regular schedule.

In New York City, nearly 42,600 people citywide tested positive from Wednesday through Saturday compared with fewer than 35,800 in the entire month of November. The city has never had so many people test positive in such a short period of time since testing became widely available.