The Biden administration told Republican senators it had $18 billion in unobligated funds for coronavirus testing, mitigation, and contact tracing, according to a summary obtained by Bloomberg Government, a pool of unused money that will likely factor into negotiations on a coronavirus relief bill, Jack Fitzpatrick reports.

Health and Human Services officials told Sens. Roy Blunt (R-Mo.) and Richard Burr (R-N.C.) the agency had $18 billion in unobligated funds for those purposes late last week, though only $4.6 billion of those funds havent been allocated for a specific purpose, according to the response. Most of the unobligated funds, $16.6 billion, were appropriated in the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 (Public Law 117-2).

Blunt and Burr requested details on coronavirus test funding in a letter this month, as the Biden administration raced to provide more testing to the public amid a surge in coronavirus cases due to the omicron variant. Any legislation providing further funds for coronavirus relief will need to have stronger reporting provisions, Blunt said in a Wednesday hallway interview. He said he appreciated the administrations response to his questions.

HHS had $97 billion for testing, mitigation, and contact tracing from 2020 legislation and the March 2021 American Rescue Plan, officials said. While officials didnt provide a comprehensive list of how those funds were spent, they provided examples of major expenditures. Some of the funds were routed to programs outside their original purpose; $2.3 billion of testing funds were used for coronavirus-related expenses for unaccompanied children entering the U.S. or to backfill funds used for the same purpose. Another $155 million was used as part of the Biden administrations program to resettle some Afghans into the U.S.

The funds included:

Bidens pledge to provide 1 billion free rapid Covid-19 tests to Americans is set to be a boon for test makers, as the omicron variant has left pharmacies and clinics scrambling to find supplies. The federal government has committed to spend at least $4.2 billion to develop, manufacture and produce rapid antigen tests since the start of the pandemic in 2020, according to a review of BGOVs contracts database. And thats before fulfilling Bidens latest pledge for free tests. Supplying the first 500 million will cost $4 billion, a top U.S. official said. Kristen V. Brown and Paul Murphy have more.

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To contact the reporters on this story: Brandon Lee in Washington at blee@bgov.com; Jack Fitzpatrick in Washington at jfitzpatrick@bgov.com

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Zachary Sherwood at zsherwood@bgov.com; Giuseppe Macri at gmacri@bgov.com; Michaela Ross at mross@bgov.com

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HEALTH CARE BRIEFING: HHS Responds to GOP Testing Funds Inquiry | Bloomberg Government - Bloomberg Government