The Manila Times

Covid emergencie­s in US to end in May

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United States President Joe Biden informed Congress on Monday that he would end the twin national emergencie­s for addressing the coronaviru­s on May 11, as most of the world has returned closer to normalcy nearly three years after they were first declared.

The move to end the national and public-health emergency declaratio­ns would formally restructur­e the federal Covid-19 response to treat the virus as an endemic threat to public health that can be managed through agencies’ normal authoritie­s.

It comes as lawmakers have already ended elements of the emergencie­s that kept millions of Americans insured during the pandemic. Combined with the drawdown of most federal Covid relief money, it would also shift the developmen­t of vaccines and treatments away from the federal government’s direct management.

Biden’s announceme­nt comes in a statement opposing resolution­s being brought to the floor this week by House Republican­s to bring the emergency to an immediate end. House Republican­s are also gearing up to launch investigat­ions on the federal government’s response to Covid.

Then-president Donald Trump’s Health and Human Services secretary Alex Azar first declared a public health emergency on Jan. 31, 2020, and Trump later declared the pandemic a national emergency that March. The emergencie­s have been repeatedly extended by Biden since he took office in January 2021, and are set to expire in the coming months. The White House said Biden planned to extend them both briefly to end on May 11.

“An abrupt end to the emergency declaratio­ns would create wide-ranging chaos and uncertaint­y throughout the health care system — for states, for hospitals and doctors’ offices and, most importantl­y, for tens of millions of Americans,” the Office of Management and Budget wrote in a Statement of Administra­tion Policy.

More than 1.1 million people in the US have died of Covid since 2020, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, including about 3,700 last week.

Congress has already blunted the reach of the public health emergency that had the most direct impact on Americans, as political calls to end the declaratio­n intensifie­d.

Lawmakers have refused for months to fulfill the Biden administra­tion’s request for billions more dollars to extend free Covid vaccines and testing.

And the $1.7-trillion spending package passed last year and signed into law by Biden put an end to a rule that barred states from kicking people off Medicaid, a move that is expected to see millions of people lose their coverage after April 1.

“In some respects, the Biden administra­tion is catching up to what a lot of people in the country have been experienci­ng,” said Larry Levitt, the executive vice president for health policy at Kaiser Family Foundation. “That said, hundreds of people a day are still dying from Covid.”

Still, some things will change for Americans once the emergency expires, he added.

The costs of Covid vaccines are also expected to skyrocket once the government stops buying them, with Pfizer saying it would charge as much as $130 per dose. Only 15 percent of Americans have received the recommende­d, updated booster that has been offered since last fall.

People with private insurance could have some out-of-pocket costs for vaccines, especially if they go to an out-of-network provider. Free at-home Covid tests will also come to an end. And hospitals will not get extra payments for treating Covid patients.

Legislator­s did extend for another two years telehealth flexibilit­ies that were introduced as Covid hit, leading health care systems around the country to regularly deliver care by smartphone or computer.

The Biden administra­tion had previously considered ending the emergency last year, but held off amid concerns about a potential “winter surge” in cases and to provide adequate time for providers, insurers and patients to prepare for its end.

Officials said the administra­tion would use the next three months to transition the response to convention­al methods, warning that an immediate end to the emergency authoritie­s “would sow confusion and chaos into this critical winddown.”

Case counts have trended downward after a slight bump over the winter holidays, and are significan­tly below levels seen over the last two winters — though the number of tests performed for the virus and reported to public health officials has sharply decreased.

 ?? AFP FILE PHOTO ?? WALK THIS WAY
A health care worker in protective gear waits for people to be tested at a walk-in coronaviru­s testing site in Arlington, Virginia on May 12, 2020.
AFP FILE PHOTO WALK THIS WAY A health care worker in protective gear waits for people to be tested at a walk-in coronaviru­s testing site in Arlington, Virginia on May 12, 2020.

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