Nomi Health Continues to Offer Zero Out-of-Pocket Cost COVID-19 Testing for All Americans, Insured or Not

While Federal Funding for COVID Testing has Ended for Uninsured Americans, the Company Continues to Provide Care, No Bills Attached

OREM, Utah--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Nomi Health, the direct healthcare company rewiring how care is paid for and delivered, today announced it will continue to welcome and serve uninsured Americans with no out-of-pocket cost COVID-19 testing at its locations nationwide, despite the ending of federal Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) Uninsured Program funding. The federal government abruptly ended support for the program on March 22, 2022, with no contingency for the 30 million vulnerable uninsured Americans, despite the emergence of another variant.

“We’re going to continue testing, even though Washington politics is leaving behind the uninsured. Testing has been the key to keeping families and communities safe, and states open for business. It is also the key to restoring trust in the world around us. Local leaders such as Miami-Dade County Mayor Levine Cava have championed the critical importance of consistent access to testing from the start. As another variant emerges, this is not the time for the federal government to pull the plug and leave millions of Americans exposed,” said Mark Newman, co-founder and CEO, Nomi Health. “Our sites remain open, serving both the insured and uninsured. If you have symptoms, you should be tested. We’re still here providing access to quality testing, and we’ll do what we’ve always done to be the solution where traditional healthcare and politics fail.”

Regardless of insurance status, none of the more than 11 million patients Nomi Health has served to date has received a bill from the company since it first began testing in April 2020. Nearly half (44 percent) of the company’s patients live in a ZIP code where the poverty rate is greater than 15 percent. Nomi Health’s policy of no out-of-pocket cost testing has enabled those in the most disadvantaged rural and urban areas to receive COVID-19 testing, in part through the support of the now defunct Uninsured Program.

“Neither politics nor money should ever stand in the way of a patient and care they need. We will do our part to transform care delivery here and now, even as we engage with our federal partners to call for needed reform.”

Nomi Health has called on Congress to take decisive action to:

• Pass a supplemental bill that includes $1.5 billion for HRSA programs for the un- and under-insured. Funding the Uninsured Program via supplemental appropriations provides access for our nation’s most at-risk populations and keeps the economy functioning.
• Include a requirement for fraud, waste and abuse oversight programs. Throughout the pandemic, Nomi Health has taken steps to ensure we are good stewards of public funds by implementation of procedures to prevent fraud, waste and abuse (FWA) in the context of our HRSA-funded activities.
• Lower costs for HRSA/federal government. Specifically, we call on Congress to adjust the HRSA testing reimbursement rate to $75 for PCR, $50 for antigen and $23 for administration. These adjustments guarantee that the additional $1.5B supplemental goes further.
• Support providers. Requiring the U.S. Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services to enforce guidelines on insurance companies paying for COVID-19 testing and pay/bill the providers - not patients.
• Support insurance payers. Out-of-network tests to be reimbursed at the Medicare rate of $100 as an add to the No Surprises Act. These reimbursements must be paid to the provider within 30 days of service. Doing so will reduce insurance company costs by approximately 30-50 percent, eliminate bad actors from the market, and improve program viability.

For more information on Nomi Health and to find a Nomi Health site near you, please visit https://nomihealth.com/covid-test-locations/.