White House To Order 500 Million Additional Covid-19 Tests And Plans To Make Higher-Quality Masks Available

President Joe Biden said Thursday his administration will make higher-quality masks available to Americans for free next week, and announced a new order of 500 million Covid-19 tests to be distributed for free.

President Joe Biden spoke about the government's response to COVID-19 in the South Court auditorium. The photo was taken by Andrew Harnik.

The Associated Press.

The federal government will distribute higher-quality masks for free next week, according to Biden.

A White House official told the news agency that he was ordering his team to procure 500 million more tests.

The administration will order more tests once they have received 500 million.

The first 500 million tests could be available as soon as next week, according to Vice President Harris.

The new order will make a total of 1 billion tests available to Americans for free.

The Biden Administration will launch a website later this month that will allow Americans to sign up for at- home tests for free.

Biden has come under fire for not doing enough to help the shortage of tests and for not making testing more widely available. Biden announced the first order of 500 million tests in December, but some experts said the action wouldn't be fast enough to stop the spread of omicron. Anne Rimoin, a professor of epidemiology at UCLA, said the U.S. was behind on testing. The first order will be a small drop in the bucket compared to the cases that are on the horizon.

The key background.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the omicron variant has led to the highest number of Covid cases ever reported in the U.S., with new cases reaching over 1.3 million on Monday. Over 155,000 people were admitted to the hospital for Covid-19 in the country, according to the Department of Human and Health Services.

Biden directed the U.S. to procure 500 million more COVID tests.

Biden is going to release free at- home covid test kits.

Biden requires insurance companies to cover at- home covid tests.

US covid hospitalizations set a new record.