RELATED: This COVID Essential Is Disappearing From Store Shelves. It appears that Walmart is selling out of its rapid at-home COVID tests. Currently, the retailer’s online store lists all four of its rapid tests as out of stock. The only coronavirus tests available on Walmart.com are PCR collection kits, which cost anywhere from $95 to $950. One rapid test, BinaxNOW, is also sold online at Walmart’s sister company, Sam’s Club, but it’s listed as out of stock there, too. “We have seen significant demand for at-home COVID-19 testing kits and are working closely with our suppliers to meet this demand and get the needed product to our customers,” a Walmart spokesperson told Best Life. “We do anticipate increased availability of the product in the coming weeks.” RELATED: This COVID Essential Is Disappearing From Shelves, Doctors Warn. The shortage of these tests is a result of the U.S. failing to develop a market for at-home home tests big enough to handle the newfound demand brought on by the Delta variant, according to an investigation from Newsy. “Right now with Delta is the first time you actually see any demand for these tests,” Sara Citrenbaum, a research specialist at rapidtests.org, told Newsy. “Last year we couldn’t convince places for the life of us to actually utilize these tests.” In late August, CVS made a move to stop customers from hoarding at-home COVID tests amid the increased demand. The retailer placed an in-store limit of four for the BinaxNOW test, QuickVue test, and a test from Ellume, and an online limit of six each, Bloomberg reported on Aug. 26.ae0fcc31ae342fd3a1346ebb1f342fcb This restriction was made “in order to serve our customers’ OTC testing needs, and due to high demand,” a CVS spokesperson told Bloomberg in an email, but CVS’ rapid tests are currently out of stock on its website. Rite Aid has also placed a purchasing limit of one for BinaxNOW’s two-count test, but this test is not currently available for purchase online. RELATED: For more up-to-date information, sign up for our daily newsletter. Hopefully, this shortage will be short-lived, as manufacturers work to up production to meet newfound demand. According to Newsy, Abbott, the maker of the BinaxNOW test, had such a surplus of its tests in May due to lack of demand that the company started to lay off employees and throw away test components that had reportedly expired before getting used. Now, they can’t keep up. Ellume told Bloomberg it was working to increase production, while Abbott told AARP that it has also started “scaling up manufacturing” recently. “We’re hiring people and turning on parts of our manufacturing network that were idled or slowed when [testing] guidance changed and demand plunged,” an Abbott spokesperson told AARP. “While there will be some supply constraints over the coming weeks as we ramp back up, we are [pulling] resources from all over the company to help meet this unprecedented demand.” RELATED: The Latest Major Shortage Is Happening at the Worst Time Possible.
