Now that the rollout of “free” guvmint COVID-19 tests is finally underway, so is the ongoing exposure of incompetence and lack of foresight in the Biden administration.
If you read my article yesterday, you learned that there apparently wasn’t a single person in the administration who had the sentience to realize that some Americans live in multi-family dwellings and that the brilliant website they had set up would limit orders to one per street address. D’oh!
Naturally, the leftist legacy media stepped in to downplay the snafu. “The United States Postal Service (USPS) said the issues people were reporting regarding ordering free rapid COVID-19 tests were affecting only a ‘small percentage of orders,'” soothed Newsweek.
[T]here were some reports on Tuesday that the USPS’ address verification tool was mistakenly enforcing the four-test cap on apartment buildings and other multi-unit dwellings.
A USPS spokesperson confirmed to Newsweek that the error was “occurring in a small percentage of orders.”
“The Postal Service is seeing very limited cases of addresses that are not registered as multi-unit buildings which could lead to COVID-19 test kit ordering difficulties,” the spokesperson said. “This is occurring in a small percentage of orders.”
I personally know plenty of people who were unable to get the free tests they bought by paying taxes, but sure, let’s go with that. Anyway, this is the Biden administration we’re talking about, and it’s another day, so there’s another planning fail. This one has to do with the seasonal weather. Did you know that it gets cold in the winter?
Canadians are familiar with cold weather. They also troubled themselves to factor in the effects cold weather can have on “free” COVID-19 test kits when they devised their distribution plans.
Canadian news site Global News reported back on Jan. 6 that “COVID-19 rapid antigen tests can’t be mailed due to temperature requirements:”
Kawartha MPP Dave Smith says mailing COVID-19 rapid antigen test kits to Ontario residents now would not be logistical because the kits need to be transported and stored at above-freezing temperatures.
Smith said the testing fluid within a kit must remain between a range of 2 C to 30 C (as outlined by Ontario Health), making it logistically impossible to mail them across Ontario during the winter months.
Huh, that sounds like something our government should have known. Oh, wait, they did know it. This official info sheet posted on the CDC website says “Store kit at 2-30°C (35.6-86° F). Do not freeze kits.”
It’s hard to believe this wasn’t taken into consideration. Maybe it only applies to that one brand of test kit on the info sheet, the Abbott BinaxNOW variety?
CBS affiliate KREM looked into that very issue. “Do cold temperatures affect the results of an at-home COVID antigen test?” they wondered. They concluded that “The answer may vary depending on the brand,” before going on to list the storage temperature requirements for the leading test brands. Spoiler alert: the lowest temperature the most cold-tolerant of them can be stored at is 35.6º F. Tests that have been stored outside the recommended temperature parameters might still work … sometimes … or they might not. False-negative results are a worrisome possibility with tests that have been frozen, if they work at all.
Related: Biden’s Incompetent Response to Omicron Forces Democrats to Face Reality
The Biden Collective has promised to ship the kits out this month: January, the coldest month of the year. How cold exactly? Here’s weather.com’s map of the average lows around the country in January:
Maybe the tests can be delivered during the warmer daytime hours?
Gulp. So all the tests which will be stored in unheated or inadequately heated USPS warehouses, or spend a day or two in the backs of unheated mail trucks, or sit in outdoor mailboxes for an hour or two will likely be compromised. Unreliable. Kaputt.
Until next time — and sadly, I’m sure there will be a next time — let’s go, Brandon!
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