Free at home Covid tests are available again

The Quarantine Zone
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Thank you! I hadn’t been aware we could get them again, and all our old ones are past their extended dates.

3

You should definitely get the new ones but you can check the old ones for updated expirations dates. Most of them got extended.

4

Thank you! Initially I thought this was old news, but I see now that they are offering four more free tests starting today.

5

Of course. A week and a half after we recovered from COVID, and a week and a half after I paid for four new tests (after the previous six I paid for).

6

Never mind

7

Thanks for the info. My Beloved and I have both sent our orders in.

8

Thanks - just put my order in.

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Note that this is another round; in September, the government was sending out four tests as well. So if you didn’t request tests then, you can get eight tests now.

10

Thanks! I just placed two orders (and hope any I use are negative).

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I don’t know where the OP’s location is, but I can chime in about Ontario. We used to be able to pick up free home tests at most any pharmacy, boxes with five tests in 'em. At some point last year, the provincial government ended that, I guess figuring we were out of the woods enough that they didn’t want to foot the bill any more. The winter surge has been going for a few weeks now, I had the virus for the second time a month ago, and I’m still testing every week or so, so the PC’s stance is a headache.

As well, it was reported last month that one importer of tests, who’d gotten billions in contracts from the feds, had provided, ah, incomplete proof of efficacy. and all of their tests were being recalled. I remember that particular box design in the story’s picture; that’s the test I used for maybe the first year of home tests. Sigh.

Anyway, pharmacies aren’t getting any more kits, but if they have any left over, you can scrounge some. When I was visiting the family over Christmas, I literally spent a morning driving around hitting every Shoppers and Rexall I could find, and amassing a stockpile. Some places had a mini-pyramid of boxes, some had nothing. I stopped in a Jean-Coutu (a Quebec-based chain of drug stores that has branches in eastern Ontario) and was told they didn’t have the free kits, but I could buy individual tests for $10 each. Right now I’ve got enough tests sitting on my kitchen table to get me through to the summer if I use them sparingly, but I don’t know if I’ll be able to get more. I’ve heard that libraries, of all places, have gotten delivereis of them. Makes sense, that’s a place where a lot of the most vulnerable will gather. I’ll have to hit up those at some point.