Cheeky sods Boots charging £6 for tests when they are still free!
What I fear is once they start charging for the test people won’t want to pay for tests so many won’t bother and people will go into work and out amongst the public with Covid not knowing if it’s a cold or covid.
The world is even more of a dangerous place for the vulnerable.
LionQueen I posted about this on another thread. But it was £6 for a single test until 1st April and then if you want a single one it will be £2.50. Not really sure what they’re playing at.
Recently I bought a pack of five RAT tests for $54 in Canberra so that is about the same price as they cost here (if you can get them).
I presume a Rapid Antigen Test is the same as a Lateral Flow Test but with better initials. 
BTW pensioners and concession card holders get them free here but that seems a reasonable price to ensure you have them available
sorry Wen, didn’t know there was already a thread on it, 
I think pensioners and vulnerable will get them free here too although I’m not certain.
£6 isn’t a lot to some people but to some it is a lot, even the ones that can afford them may not buy them though, one of my colleagues told me today she wouldn’t buy one.
LionQueen no there’s not another thread on it, I posted a link to the Daily Mail article on another Covid thread the one regarding the ending of all restrictions.
LionQueen yup vulnerable will get them free, don’t think all pensioners are though. And Boots are only charging £6 whilst it’s still free to get them in packs of 7, then they’ll be charging £2.50 for a single test. Or £30 for a pack of 7.
Yes I believe they are the same Bruce, it actually states Rapid Antigen Test on the boxes here.
I think that has always been the case Lion Queen, some people can not afford to have time off work since furlough was stopped. This would also explain the speed at which Omicron swept through the country.
This is the post I posted on the other thread:
People who are not vulnerable to Covid and wish to continue testing will have to purchase the rapid tests from Boots and other high street pharmacies after April 1 in England.
Boots will sell individual Covid tests for SIX POUNDS from tomorrow but will slash price to £2.50 by April as experts urge ministers to introduce Spain-like cap to stop retailers cashing in
A bloke at my workplace went into work knowing he had covid, he even told someone, he got the sack 
Now that’s what I call selfish Lion Queen, he got what he deserved in my opinion.
Well once the free tests come to an end, lots of people will be going into work with Covid, because they won’t know whether they’ve got it or not if they don’t want to pay to find out. I mean, would you pay for a test just to find out that you’ve only got a cold? That’s what so many people have report Omicron feels like.
It’s just personal opinion, but I think anyone who buys & takes a covid test after the free tests stops is wasting their time & money. UNLESS. They are taking a test prior to visiting someone who could be vulnerable to covid. There is now no need to isolate, so what is gained by testing?
That’s it in a nutshell.
As a consequence, there will be thousands of “casualties” directly and indirectly from COVID but BJ is expecting that the total number of deaths from “common” respiratory diseases , the “headline figure”, will not be significantly increased by letting COVID-19 run wild, like common colds and 'flu.
Of course, BJ doesn’t know this for a fact and the multiple mistakes that he has made in his approach to the COVID pandemic so far have already cost this country dear - as examples, £37,000,000,000 for the flawed Test and Trace system and well over 150,000 official COVID-related deaths (the worst record in Europe) - so the uncontrolled release of the virus into the community is more of a gamble than a calculated risk.
Indeed … cost versus gain … those on limited incomes just won’t bother, those with an expense account won’t notice the difference … 
Funny thing, I mentioned earlier that I bought a 5 pack of RATs while I was in Canberra, well today I was in the chemist filling a prescription and they gave me 5 single tests which is apparently my monthly allowance of these things.
It might well be that we have gone from famine to feast with these tests (another Scotty from Marketing stuff up). Of course now I have ten of the damn things. They are still required to cross state borders so I threw the five pack into my camper for such an eventuality.
BTW I paid $54 for the five tests from the newsagent in Canberra but this pack of tests is taped together with a $59.30 price tag which I presume is what the chemist will charge the federal government.
I think it’s right that the tests will no longer be free, 2 billion a month is a helluva lot of money to pay. I’d prefer that money to be spent on the NHS. We’ve got antivirals now. Majority of people have been vaccinated.
Only 324 people in icu as of 21st February as compared to 2,329 in icu on 21st February in 2021.
There’s plenty of contagious bugs that go around that can kill and we don’t constantly be tested for, Norovirus being one of them.
Lots of other countries charge for them:
I was astonished at the price of the tests here .
Luckily I brought a pack with me for the U.K. just in case .
I do think a nominal charge could have been made for them in the first place .
Price wars now lol
High street pricing war for lateral flows: Now Lloyds undercuts rival pharmacy chains Superdrug and Boots to sell Covid tests for just £1.89 ahead of No10 scrapping free swabs in April
