President Joe Biden announced today the deployment of additional military medical teams to hospitals in six “hard-hit” states alongside plans to procure and ship 500 million more rapid COVID-19 tests for home use.
Speaking to the press this morning, President Biden said that more than 800 military and other federal emergency personnel have been deployed across 24 states, tribes and territories to support healthcare providers’ COVID-19 response. Further, more than 14,000 National Guard members have been activated in 49 states, he said.
Building on the federal personnel promises of late December, Biden said that the government is deploying six teams of more than 120 military medical personnel to hospitals in Michigan, New York, New Jersey, Ohio and Rhode Island.
The president said that he has also instructed his team to double the number of at-home rapid tests that will be purchased by the government and provided to Americans at no cost. He also noted that the website for ordering those tests is “on track” to roll out sometime next week.
Further, Biden promised updates next week on how the administration will be making “high-quality” face masks available to the public, also for free.
“I know we all wish we could finally be done with wearing masks, I get it,” the President said. “But they’re a really important tool to stop the spread, especially of a highly transmissible omicron variant. So please wear the mask.”
The President peppered his updates with these types of requests urging Americans “no matter your political party” to continue or begin mitigation behaviors, most notably those involving masks and vaccines.
“I’ll make a special appeal to social media companies and media outlets: please deal with the misinformation and disinformation that’s on your shows. It has to stop,” Biden said. “COVID-19 is one of the most formidable enemies America’s ever faced. We’ve got to work together, not against each other. We’re America, we can do this.”
The omicron variant has fueled a new wave of COVID-19 that is sidelining healthcare personnel and filling up more hospitals than ever before.
On Wednesday, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Director Rochelle Walensky, M.D. reported the country’s hospitals are seeing a seven-day average of roughly 19,800 new COVID-19 admissions per day.
Today’s announcements from President Biden extend or expand previously announced efforts that critics generally saw as a positive, if delayed, step in the right direction.