Who Got The Best Deal For COVID Protection:
~ The Consumer Or Corporations?
COVID variants continue to emerge, and a surge of post-holiday infections created an increased demand for home tests. To avoid overwhelming the healthcare system yet again it remains vital to provide home test kits to American households. The U.S. government has responded by tasking the Defense Department with awarding some very lucrative contracts totaling nearly $2 billion for 380 million over the counter test kits. Of the approximately 60 companies that responded to the bidding, contracts were awarded to 3: iHealth Labs for $1.275 billion, Roche Diagnostics for $340 million, and Abbott Rapid Dx North America for $306 million. Information regarding the contract details are vague at best, so it is virtually impossible to determine if the U. S government overpaid or could have paid less per kit. The truth of the matter is that OTC antigen test kits are readily available to American households from local pharmacies, grocery stores, online, handed out by faith-based and other non-profits, and even mailed to homes without even requesting them, FREE OF CHARGE!
As a health insurance broker I wonder how much the insurance industry has spent on testing and treating since the federal government required these costs to be fully covered for all regardless of insurance coverage. I notice the cost of testing varies widely, depending on where you live, type of lab where the specimen is tested, insurance carrier, among other factors. The cost to treat those that were hospitalized and, in the ICU, must have been astronomical and yet, health insurance rate increases were not.
Although the U.S. taxpayers paid for the tests and the USPS delivered the tests; and healthcare providers were probably richly compensated for treating COVID patients; and some corporations raked in billions of dollars to provide the tests, even though the actual costs per test are unknown. But the treatments and tests also reduce the number of people dying from this dreadful deadly and contagious disease and allow us to resume our lives out of quarantine.
So, the question remains - who got the better deal for COVID protection and treatment during the global pandemic? And, ultimately, does it really matter?
