Feds Launch ‘One-Stop’ Website for All COVID Resources

March 30, 2022 — President Joe Biden on Wednesday unveiled a federal web site that guarantees “one-stop shopping” without spending a dime masks and COVID-19 checks, vaccines, and coverings.

The web site, covid.gov, additionally features a listing of pharmacies that will likely be a part of the brand new “test-to-treat” program.

“You’ll also be able to find our new test-to-treat locations,” Biden mentioned at a information briefing. “These are pharmacies and other places in your neighborhood where you can get tested, and if you’re positive, you can get life-saving treatments in one stop.”

Soon after his remarks, he acquired a second booster of the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine. The FDA and CDC approved the fourth dose of the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines on Tuesday for Americans over 50 and folks over 18 who meet particular circumstances.

For Americans in search of a vaccine or a booster, covid.gov encompasses a hyperlink to vaccines.gov, the place you may go to discover a native vaccination heart. The public may also use covid.gov to order free checks for dwelling supply (customers are taken to covidtests.gov) and to search out free masks, through a hyperlink to a CDC webpage.

You can search covid.gov by tackle or ZIP code to search out close by pharmacies, federally certified neighborhood well being facilities, Indian Health Service websites, or Veterans Affairs (VA) clinics that provide test-to-treat providers.

Throughout the pandemic, it’s been exhausting to search out one supply to assist navigate every little thing somebody may have to struggle COVID, says Jen Kates, PhD, senior vp and director of world well being for the Kaiser Family Foundation.

Covid.gov “is a good step forward to bring everything under one internet roof,” she says. A one-stop store “will facilitate access.”

As states, counties, and cities start shuttering their very own government-funded applications, having the ability to simply discover websites for COVID-related providers might grow to be extra essential, Kates says.

Some states and localities have been closing down websites due to a decline in demand and case counts. There can also be a priority amongst states that they won’t be able to proceed if federal cash to reimburse for checks, vaccines, and coverings dries up.

The White House has been warning that provides might run low if it doesn’t get not less than $22.5 billion in emergency funds to struggle the pandemic. Congress has not but agreed on whether or not to approve that request.

In the meantime, the White House has lowered shipments of monoclonal antibodies to states by a 3rd, and Biden mentioned provides would run out by the top of May.

The president additionally famous that the federal government won’t have sufficient vaccines available this fall to present each American a second booster shot, though he mentioned there are sufficient for these over 50 and immunocompromised folks.

“Congress, we need to secure additional supply now,” Biden mentioned. “We can’t wait until we find ourselves in the midst of another surge to act. It will be too late.”

Test-to-Treat Challenges

The president introduced the test-to-treat initiative in his State of the Union speech on March 2. The concept is that individuals who check optimistic for COVID-19 in a pharmacy or at a well being clinic can be eligible to obtain, instantly and freed from cost, considered one of two antiviral tablets approved by the FDA — Pfizer’s Paxlovid or Merck’s molnupiravir. Both have to be taken inside 5 days after signs seem to forestall critical sickness.

Biden mentioned that 2,000 areas throughout the U.S. would now provide test-to-treat, together with 240 federally certified neighborhood well being facilities, Indian Health Service websites, VA well being clinics, and greater than 60 Department of Defense medical therapy services.

Kates says the test-to-treat idea is essential, however “the execution is going to be hard.” But “we all know as quickly as you get a analysis, the earlier you get on therapy, the higher.”

She says COVID-related provide points with checks, vaccines, and particularly therapies like Paxlovid are going to create challenges. And pharmacists’ potential to deal with sufferers is perhaps restricted in some states by legal guidelines that govern the apply of drugs.

Indeed, medical doctors’ teams have objected to pharmacists having the ability to dispense a medicine on to a affected person, due to the opportunity of negative effects. Pharmacists additionally aren’t more likely to know somebody’s full medical historical past, teams such because the American Medical Association have mentioned.

And pharmacies have considerations that this system might solely be carried out by shops with on-site clinics, which might restrict the kind and variety of pharmacies that might participate.

Most of the test-to-treat pharmacies listed on covid.gov look like massive chains, reminiscent of CVS and Walgreens, or supermarket-affiliated pharmacies, though there additionally look like some impartial shops in some areas.