Pop-up testing sites have cropped up on street corners, in parking lots, and on shopping properties across the country, But now an additional problem has emerged: The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) is warning about fraudulent testing kits being sold online to desperate customers.
Let’s talk about the testing sites, first. Sandra Jaramillo of San Antonio, Texas needed a negative Covid-19 test to return to work and was having trouble finding a testing site that could give same-day results.
She decided to stop at a pop-up testing site set up in the parking lot of a church near her home. Under a small tent, she was told to give her driver’s license number, date of birth, and email address before she was handed a swab to administer the test on herself.
She has yet to receive any results, and the telephone number listed on the information sheet is not being answered. She is now panicked that her personal information may have been compromised.
Situations like Jaramillo experienced are now happening all across the United States. In the past few weeks, legislators and attorneys general in several states including Illinois, Maryland, California, Texas, and Pennsylvania have said they will begin investigating and introducing regulatory legislation overseeing these operations.
In Chicago, Illinois, the nonprofit news organization Block Club Chicago reported that a number of these questionable testing sites are also unsanitary – pointing out that workers were not wearing masks or gloves. Conditions were being described as a “hellhole.”
“With the increasing demand for Covid tests, people can expect to run across fake tests online and maybe even more of the fake testing sites we saw earlier in the pandemic,” Colleen Tressler, a consumer education specialist with the Federal Trade Commission Bureau of Consumer Protection, said.
“Scammers believe in supply and demand, too, so where there’s demand for tests, scammers will fake the supply.”
And here is something that will be hard to swallow: Since the pandemic began, the FTC has received over 650,000 reports of Covid-related fraud, identity theft, and other scams, which have cost Americans over $636 million.
Just remember this advice from Marian Liu, a professor of nursing at the Center on Aging and the Life Course at Purdue University: Not all testing clinics are malicious or illegal. But some probably are illegal.
She advises that people be cautious when thinking about going to any of these sites. Some are charging for tests when in most cases you don’t have to pay for them.
For some, they play on the convenience of “going right around the corner,” but as Covid cases continue to soar, “they’re functioning on the fact that people are desperate,” according to Liu.
Fake Covid-19 testing kits
As the Omicron variant continues to fuel a dramatic rise in coronavirus cases across the country, we have been left with long lines at testing sites and empty shelves at stores where at-home rapid test kits were once in stock.
With so many people frantically searching for the elusive test kits, someone you don’t know is taking advantage of your distress and turning a nice profit at your expense.
“It’s not a surprise that, according to the US Food and Drug Administration, fake and unauthorized at-home testing kits are popping up online as opportunistic scammers take advantage of the spike in demand,” the FTC said in a press release this week.
Coronavirus self-tests — also known as home tests or over-the-counter tests — are one of several risk-reduction measures that can protect people by reducing the chances of spreading coronavirus, according to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
These tests can be taken at home or anywhere, regardless of vaccination status or symptoms, and are easy to use for quick results, the CDC says. However, they are in short supply and getting more expensive.
This is forcing some people to search online or anywhere to find them. But buyers should be wary of scammers selling fake kits. The FTC has some advice for people looking for test kits:
- 1. Only buy tests authorized by the US Food and Drug Administration. The FDA’s website has a list of more than 40 authorized home tests, some of which have age restrictions. You can buy these tests online, at pharmacies and some retail stores.
- 2. Check the FDA’s list of fraudulent Covid-19 products to ensure the test kit you’re about to buy, or the company you’re going to buy it from, isn’t on there.
- 3. Look at a variety of sellers and compare credible reviews from expert sources like medical professionals or health organizations before making a purchase decision.
To date, Covid-19 has killed at least 833,987 people and infected about 58.5 million in the US, according to Johns Hopkins University.
