The U.S. federal government suspended its free at-home COVID-19 test program on Sept. 2.
An unnamed White House official told CNN on Aug. 29 that the decision to suspend the program was motivated by a lack of funding from Congress and efforts to preserve supply for a projected fall surge in cases.
“Ordering through the free at-home test program was suspended on Friday, September 2 because Congress hasn’t provided additional funding to replenish the nation’s stockpile of tests,” reads the banner added to the covid.gov website following the Aug. 29 announcement.
“We have warned that Congressional inaction would force unacceptable tradeoffs and harm our overall COVID-19 preparedness and response—and that the consequences would likely worsen over time,” the White House official told CNN. “Unfortunately, because of the limited funding we have to work with, we have had to make impossible choices about which tools and programs to invest in—and which ones we must downsize, pause, or end all together.”
The program was first implemented in January 2022, to make testing more accessible during the rise of the Omicron variant.
White House officials reported a lack of funding for the program from Congress as early as March. “I want to be very clear: Additional funds are necessary in the very near future to avoid disruptions to ongoing Covid response efforts,” Jeff Zients, the White House’s COVID-19 response coordinator, said at America’s Health Insurance Plans national conference on March 14.
The White House official said that the federal government plans to resume the program when Congress provides the additional funding. “Until then, we believe reserving the remaining tests for distribution later this year is the best course,” the official said.
