Rapid At Home COVID Tests Will be Available This Week

As our nation moves forward after a drastic year of shutdowns, quarantine, and serious illness, we are starting to see some light at the end of the tunnel. Vaccines for COVID-19 are becoming more readily available, and with that, things are slowly opening up, and dare we say, returning to '"normal".

When Can I Get an At-Home COVID Test?

This week, people who want to test themselves for the coronavirus in the privacy of their own homes are going to get that chance.

Where Will Rapid At-Home COVID Tests be Available?

Three national retail chains will be selling rapid at home tests with no prescription necessary starting this week. Walmart, CVS, and Walgreens will make the coronavirus self-test kits available to consumers in stores, and also online.

How Much Will At-Home COVID Tests Cost?

The Abbott Laboratories' BinaxNOW tests received the Food and Drug Administration emergency-use authorization for serial screening last month and will cost $23.99. Another test made by Ellume in Australia will also be available to CVS customers in Rhode Island and Massachusetts starting in May. That test will cost $38.99, and will be sold in stores and online.

For those who do not want to visit a health provider or doctor, this can be just one more barrier down to get tested for coronavirus. The tests come two to a pack and will take about 15 minutes to get results, and no lab is required. Jennifer Nuzzo, a senior scholar at the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security tells USA Today that "I still have worries, and the biggest lingering one is the potential cost of these tests. This increases options for some, not all. So we have to keep working to make these tests more widely available."