White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki mocked the idea of mailing out free covid-19 tests to every American household on Monday, just the latest sign that President Joe Biden's lack of imagination is making the Pandemic worse.
There are 28 million Americans without health insurance, and the Biden administration plans to reimburse people for the costs of rapid covid-19 tests through insurance. The White House press pool wanted to know why the U.S. was implementing a complicated rebate scheme when other countries were making the tests free.
Germany, the UK, and South Korea have massive testing for free or for a nominal fee. A reporter asked during the White House daily press conference if that could be done in the United States.
The FDA has approved eight of the tests we have. We think that is the gold standard. The scientists and medical experts have to decide whether or not the tests meet the standard, but I don't think they will.
The goal is to increase accessibility and decrease costs. 150 million Americans will get their tests funded because of what we've done over the course of time, and we've cut the cost significantly over the past few months.
The reporter asked if it was possible to make them free and have them available everywhere.
Should we send one to every American? Psaki was dripping with disdain for a good idea.
The reporter was asked if it was possible.
What happens if every American takes a test? What happens after that? She thought someone had gotten the upper hand.
The answer should be that it costs whatever it costs because we are in a once-in-a-century pandemic and that people will be sent for more tests after that.
The reporter pointed out that other countries seem to be making them available in greater quantities for less money.
We both want to make them more accessible, right? Psaki said that every country will do that differently.
When asked why prescription drugs are more expensive in the U.S. than anywhere else in the world, large pharmaceutical companies try to bring up the fact that the U.S. uses inferior tests.
The FDA approves our tests. It doesn't work that way in every country. We are working to build on what we have already done and build out our testing capacity.
American exceptionalism was on full display at the White House on Monday in Psaki's efforts to convince the average person that somehow Americans are getting. The FDA is just as strict when approving tests as the UK medical regulators are.
There were over 200,000 new cases of covid-19 reported in the US on Monday and over 1,300 new deaths from the disease. The U.S. has an average of over 118,000 new daily cases and 1,289 new deaths every day over the past week.
The U.S. vaccination rate is still low, despite political concerns, and many people are not getting vaccine against covid-19. Given the country's divisiveness, there isn't much President Biden can do to convince a third of the population to get the shot.
According to the Kaiser Family Foundation, 9% of Democrats don't plan to get vaccine against covid-19, while 38% of Republicans don't want to be vaccine against it.
Covid-19 is not going away soon. The last thing Americans need is to be told that their covid-19 tests are expensive because they are better than tests in other countries. It shows a lack of imagination by the Biden administration for the possibility of bringing down health care costs in the U.S.
