White House promises free COVID-19 tests, despite not enough supply to meet the demand

"Under President Biden’s leadership, we are requiring insurers and group health plans to make tests free for millions of Americans. This is all part of our overall strategy to ramp-up access to easy-to-use, at-home tests at no cost," Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra said on Monday.

In December, Biden announced that 500 million coronavirus tests had been ordered by the administration and would be made available free of charge in January.

As detailed by Fox News, plans to make the tests readily available to every American have gone awry as testing shortages continue to plague the country.

The Biden administration is encouraging insurers to set up programs with pharmacies to allow Americans to get tests through their plans with no up-front costs, instead of having to submit a claim for reimbursement.

Additionally, the White House has updated the timeline on when Americans can expect to order one of the 500 million tests and receive them through the mail. On Monday, White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki said that details of a website are forthcoming.

Psaki promised the press that the 500 million tests “should be awarded over the next two weeks” and that Americans will be able to “order these tests online later this month.”

"We expect that the contracts are structured in a way to require that significant amounts are delivered on an aggressive timeline, the first of which should be arriving early next week," Psaki said.