HHS announced it ended its free COVID-19 tests to community organizations as it focuses on ending the nation's chronic disease issues.
Americans who ordered tests through community partnership by 5 p.m. May 30 will still receive their order, according to HHS.
HHS is in the midst of purchasing one million newer tests that are able to differentiate between the COVID-19 virus versus the flu, which will be deployed if there are any shortfalls or emergencies with the COVID testing, Fox Digital learned.
State or local health departments, as well as community organizations that have a stockpile of tests and various local health centers may still provide free tests to Americans as the program shutters, according to HHS.
The COVID-19 pandemic, which tore across the country in 2020, officially ended years ago. Then-President Joe Biden declared the pandemic was "over" back in 2022, while the World Health Organization determined the pandemic officially ended by 2023.
The announcement comes as the Trump administration's top health department re-focuses its direction to addressing the nation's spiraling chronic health issues, which come in the form of health issues such as rampant obesity, spikes in autism diagnoses and teenage depression.
Robert F. Kennedy and the MAHA commission released its report on youth chronic illnesses in May. (Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)
Chronic diseases have a chilling effect on national security, commission members said in a Thursday morning phone call with the media. Roughly 75% of America's youth aged 17–24 do not qualify to serve in the military due to obesity, asthma, allergies, autoimmune diseases or behavioral disorders, they said.
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"We now have the most obese, depressed, disabled, medicated population in the history of the world, and we cannot keep going down the same road," Food and Drug Commissioner Marty Makary said in the phone call with the media. "So this is an amazing day. I hope this marks the grand pivot from a system that is entirely reactionary to a system that will now be proactive."
The MAHA report will be followed by a policy recommendation report for the federal government later this summer.
https://www.foxnews.com/politics/hhs-ends-biden-era-covid-19-testing-program-bled-taxpayers-years-after-pandemic