testing positive for covid. many of the omicron cases interestingly are either without symptoms or minimally symptomatic. particularly the breakthrough cases. reporter: monday more than 7400 flights were delayed. and the seasonal rush is also creating a heavy demand on covid testing. all i can do is wait. several places is the same. reporter: testing locations are swamped with lines ramped around for blocks. and president biden conceding the steps he took earlier to scale up testing capacity have been insufficient in the wake of the omicron surge. we went there no over-the-counter tests in january to 46 million in october, 100 million in november and almost 200 million in december. but it is not enough. clearly not enough. reporter: the administration is preparing another 500 million free rapid at-home tests for
for the possibility of additional variants in the future. and so people should have an expectation that we are expanding the market for over-the-counter tests. they will become more and more available and that we are going to make n95 masks more and more available. so 500 million test kits that are now available through the website, jose. and then in the coming weeks and months, they say, another 500 million that will be available through the website or other means. so, heidi, how does the administration plan to distribute those 400 million n95 masks? they re going to do it the same way they did the vaccines, which is through the federal pharmacy program, through local community centers. so the same places you went to get your vaccines or test kits, you can go to get these n95 masks. i asked him, is this just going to be for priority groups, because these have been in such short supply. he said, no, while we would like elderly people to get to the
Transcripts for CNN Anderson Cooper 360 20211228 01:17:30 archive.org - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from archive.org Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
responsibility or be held accountable. accord to joe biden no one could have predicted a winter surge. watch this. the second thing we are doing is more testing. seeing how tough it was for some folks to get a test this weekend shows we have more work to do. we went from no over-the-counter tests in january to 100 million in october and 200 million in december. it s not enough. approximate it we had known, we would have gone harder and quicker if we could have. pete: i can barely understand what he is saying. he had a year. they did know. almost everyone on earth knew that a winter surge as things get colder and people move inside, it was all predictable. according to a report in vanity fair, they still turned down a plan in october it increase the numbers of at home tests. maybe you would not be late on your flight if there were at