COVID 19 White House Giving Away Free COVID Tests Again

Eric said:
Just breaking, sounds like they're make them available at a cost of $600 million. Should be available next week covidtest.gov
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TBH, I never liked the tests I received from the government as much as Abbott's BinaxNOW, which I find easier to use. It's important to note that while current antigen tests can detect circulating SARS CoV-2 strains, they're probably somewhat less sensitive to these variants, so repeat testing is advisable to ensure that the number of viral copies has risen high enough to register.
 
Roller said:
TBH, I never liked the tests I received from the government as much as Abbott's BinaxNOW, which I find easier to use. It's important to note that while current antigen tests can detect circulating SARS CoV-2 strains, they're probably somewhat less sensitive to these variants, so repeat testing is advisable to ensure that the number of viral copies has risen high enough to register.
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Not sure which tests they will be sending, I know that Kaiser offers them from different vendors depending on availability and wonder if the Government will do the same.

BTW I applaud this move, it's a sensible thing to do for the American people and knowledge is power when it comes to this.

Here's a link
www.nytimes.com

U.S. Will Resume Offering Free At-Home Covid Tests (Published 2023)

The Biden administration is restarting a program that has provided hundreds of millions of free tests through the Postal Service.
www.nytimes.com www.nytimes.com
 
Eric said:
Not sure which tests they will be sending, I know that Kaiser offers them from different vendors depending on availability and wonder if the Government will do the same.

BTW I applaud this move, it's a sensible thing to do for the American people and knowledge is power when it comes to this.

Here's a link
www.nytimes.com

U.S. Will Resume Offering Free At-Home Covid Tests (Published 2023)

The Biden administration is restarting a program that has provided hundreds of millions of free tests through the Postal Service.
www.nytimes.com www.nytimes.com
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I agree. Sadly, though, many people will consider it a waste of money because "COVID is over."
 
The rapid tests we have up here are only about 36% effective against the Omicron variants, so a crap shoot if they report a positive result.

It IS making the rounds up here - my team of 15, about 6 of them have had it already. I might have it now (should have started wearing a mask on the train and in the grocery store already) :(
 
Alli said:
I’m sure my stash of tests are all expired, so I will be ordering more.
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If you haven’t double checked already, I recommend taking a look at the MFG website to see if any of your tests have had their expiration date expired. If you look at tests that use similar technology that are more established, they often last multiple years on the self. The novelty of the COVID tests prevented long term stability testing thus the early tests only had a shelf life of 3 months (but were extended many times over).

Provided the packaging is in tact and they were not stored in extreme temps, the more likely issue is that newer COVID variants like omicron are not detected as well as earlier variations.

It would be nice to see the tests get updated to meet the current environment… but perhaps the incentive is not yet present for that to happen.
 
AG_PhamD said:
If you haven’t double checked already, I recommend taking a look at the MFG website to see if any of your tests have had their expiration date expired. If you look at tests that use similar technology that are more established, they often last multiple years on the self. The novelty of the COVID tests prevented long term stability testing thus the early tests only had a shelf life of 3 months (but were extended many times over).

Provided the packaging is in tact and they were not stored in extreme temps, the more likely issue is that newer COVID variants like omicron are not detected as well as earlier variations.

It would be nice to see the tests get updated to meet the current environment… but perhaps the incentive is not yet present for that to happen.
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Right, I was able to use one that was expired as well. Here is a complete list you can reference.
www.fda.gov

At-Home OTC COVID-19 Diagnostic Tests

Expiration dates and more about authorized at-home OTC COVID-19 diagnostic tests information.
www.fda.gov www.fda.gov
 
Well just got the free tests and now I know why the HHS released the extenened expiration lists. These free test are expired, and extended out for another 2 months. I don’t trust the quality of these tests and besides now that recently was Covid positive, I shouldn’t need to test for 90 days.

So my personal experience with these extended experation date test is I had a bunch of Binex 2 antigen tests that expired on 6/26/2023, and my wife was feeling ill. I went to the HHS site and confirmed that the expiration date is now 1/26/2024. Great! Because the local CVS was out of tests. We went through 3 tests in two days while her symptom got worse and worse. We were both shocked to find that she is negative. I finally asked one of our family members to get us a fresh test at another CVS in the area, that I called and found they had about 12 tests. When she took it, the T line popped up in about 60 seconds.

No way will I personally trust any test on the extended expiration date list. I bet there are some midigating factors, like how it is stored in your house. My tests were shoved in a drawer, in the living room. I bet the room got into the mid it late 80s when we were away for vacation for a week this summer.
 
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I apologize for raising an old thread from the back pages, but I haven't seen much about this subject on this forum and with the latest surge in America I thought I'd share.

I don't know about anybody else's covid vaccine thoughts anymore, but I just received the latest booster 2024-2025 yesterday evening, and this one I can tell you is a bear. I just awoke from a 4 hour nap that I had no choice to take, and althoguh I don't feel like I did in Oct 2023 when I contracted covid 19, this is by far the toughest booster I have had. After my 2023 experience, I am not f'n around with it. I don't feel I have fully recovered still.
 
rdrr said:
I apologize for raising an old thread from the back pages, but I haven't seen much about this subject on this forum and with the latest surge in America I thought I'd share.

I don't know about anybody else's covid vaccine thoughts anymore, but I just received the latest booster 2024-2025 yesterday evening, and this one I can tell you is a bear. I just awoke from a 4 hour nap that I had no choice to take, and althoguh I don't feel like I did in Oct 2023 when I contracted covid 19, this is by far the toughest booster I have had. After my 2023 experience, I am not f'n around with it. I don't feel I have fully recovered still.
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Wow sorry to hear that, makes you wonder if it was necessary to boost your response. When I contracted COVID last year (around this time) I was really sick for a couple of weeks but I hadn't been boosted in over 6 months.

Now it's been since last December and I'm sure to suffer some from the next dose but I'll just take Tylenol like I did during a couple of the more severe reactions I've had. Did you happen to get the flu jab at the same time?
 
Eric said:
Wow sorry to hear that, makes you wonder if it was necessary to boost your response. When I contracted COVID last year (around this time) I was really sick for a couple of weeks but I hadn't been boosted in over 6 months.

Now it's been since last December and I'm sure to suffer some from the next dose but I'll just take Tylenol like I did during a couple of the more severe reactions I've had. Did you happen to get the flu jab at the same time?
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No, not the flu shot, just the lates covid-19. I will waiting until late September, early October for the flu shot. One reason I decide to get the latest shot, was that I am going overseas soon, and I don't want to have anything f that trip up. Also I will be getting surgery Oct 17th and we all know the best chance of contracting it is in the hospital.
 
I scheduled my flu/covid shots for late september. Playing the “see if i can time them for maximum effect” game, and i took my last ones late September last year anyway. I’d take them every 6 months if they were offered…
 
Cmaier said:
I scheduled my flu/covid shots for late september. Playing the “see if i can time them for maximum effect” game, and i took my last ones late September last year anyway. I’d take them every 6 months if they were offered…
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Same here and I think they would let us if we asked.
 
The three of us (husband, mother, me) have our new Covid boosters and flu shots scheduled for tomorrow.

rdrr said:
Also I will be getting surgery Oct 17th and we all know the best chance of contracting it is in the hospital.
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That must be a thing for doctors to schedule as many procedures as possible on that date. I’m also going in then.
 

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