Biden Admin Rejected October Proposal For “Free Rapid Tests For The Holidays”
The Biden administration – which first said they ‘didn’t see Omicron coming’ – only to be rebuffed by Anthony ‘oh yes we did’ Fauci, rejected an October proposal to provide rapid at-home tests to Americans before the holidays, allowing them to screen themselves at will and thereby help reduce transmission.
We didn’t do it, Joe!
The plan, obtained by Vanity Fair, called for an estimated 732 million tests per month, and recommended – right on the first page – a nationwide “Testing Surge to Prevent Holiday COVID Surge.”
The plan, in effect, was a blueprint for how to avoid what is happening at this very moment—endless lines of desperate Americans clamoring for tests in order to safeguard holiday gatherings, just as COVID-19 is exploding again. Yesterday, President Biden told David Muir of ABC News, “I wish I had thought about ordering” 500 million at-home tests “two months ago.” But the proposal shared at the meeting in October, disclosed here for the first time, included a “Bold Plan for Impact” and a provision for “Every American Household to Receive Free Rapid Tests for the Holidays/New Year.” -VF
We’re sure the same lefties who spent most of 2020 and 2021 dramatically criticizing Trump’s response to Covid will chime in anytime…
The proposed tests, while less accurate that polymerase chain reaction (PCR) tests, would detect the virus when patients are at their most contagious.
Three days after an Oct. 22 meeting to discuss the tests, the Covid-19 testing experts – from the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health as well as the Rockefeller Foundation, the COVID Collaborative and several other organizations received a back-channel communication from the White House. Their idea, they were told, was dead.
“The White House, in baseball terms, was playing small ball,” said Dr. Steven Phillips, a vice president of science and strategy for the Covid Collaborative, a team of high-level experts working to develop consensus recommendations for policy makers (via Vanity Fair). “When it comes to rapid testing, they’re bunting the players along.”
According to an administration official who attended the Oct. 22 meeting, while everyone present thought it was a good idea, the plan wasn’t feasible at the time. “We did not have capacity to manufacture over-the-counter tests at that scale,” they said – noting that the FDA had only authorized a handful of different home tests, and those that were authorized couldn’t be made fast enough.
In short, the Biden administration couldn’t manage to finally do what many other countries had already done.
Instead, as Omicron began carving a path of serious sniffles through US states, the Biden admin announced a ‘smattering of smaller-scale plans that included requiring insurance companies to reimburse privately insured patients who buy at-home rapid tests,’ which sell for as much as $35 for a box of two tests. Now, most Americans can’t find them as widespread shortages persist.
Adding insult to injury, White House Press Secretary scoffed at the idea of nationwide home tests three weeks ago.
“Should we just send one to every American?”
Jen Psaki somewhat mockingly asks reporter at the White House Daily Press Briefing if the US should be sending out rapid #COVID19 tests to every household.
In the UK you can order 1 pack (containing 7 tests) everyday. https://t.co/ErnSsiLxxl pic.twitter.com/L7ruKWdy5n
— Matt Karolian (@mkarolian) December 6, 2021
Read the rest of the report here as you consider what a horrible person Jen Psaki is, and the administration she represents.
Is she deliberately sending a message by wearing black before Christmas or does she just have bad taste?
— Ed ☯️Free Thinker & Oracle (@DowdEdward) December 23, 2021
Tyler Durden Sat, 12/25/2021 – 18:30
