It is likely that the US government will request more funding for COVID-19 testing from Reuters

By Ahmed Aboulenein

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – President Joe Biden’s administration is likely to ask Congress for additional funding for COVID-19 testing, depending on the severity of the Omicron variant, U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra said Tuesday.

The department has $ 10 billion left in federal relief funds to make the $ 50 billion test available to Congress in March, but it will probably need more, Becerra said in a meeting with reporters.

“Will we have the needs and costs of more than $ 10 trillion? COVID, especially when it comes to testing, is a great opportunity, once again, depending on where Omicron leads us,” he said.

Becerra said he did not know whether additional funds were needed, as health officials could not yet predict the impact Omicron would have.

“Do we have Omicron as we have Delta? You can see where this is going. The President said we need to continue before. So we don’t want to ask Congress for money once we know. It needs to.”

As part of Biden’s strategy to fight Omicron and Delta variants in the winter, the government is demanding that private health insurers reimburse 150 million customers from January onwards for the cost of COVID-19 testing both indoors and outdoors. The government will not reimburse the insurers, a White House official said.

The United States will buy more antiviral treatments in the coming months to deal with the spread of Omicron, Becerra said, adding that details will be announced soon.

“In terms of therapy … we’re getting stronger,” he said. “We’re trying to see what Omicron does and what works for these different therapies, and we’re preparing, we’re preparing. Stay tuned for where we’re going to go, and we’re marking everything when we’re talking.”