Lateral flow tests are running out as they are quietly rationed in the weeks before Boris Johnson scraps free tests.
The Government has changed the rules so only one box of LFTs can be ordered every three days amid a huge surge in demand before the rules change.
This was changed without any announcement from one box every 24 hours as the Prime Minister announced his bonfire of pandemic safeguards.
Reports on social media suggest free tests have already run out locally in many areas of the country.
Prices are yet to be confirmed but people may have to pay £5 each or £20 for a box when the change comes in from April 1.
Free testing, including for those with symptoms, will be scrapped for everybody apart from the most vulnerable.
Twitter user Lucy Winter posted: “I have a brother and sister both with Parkinson’s, I rely on LFTs before going to see them.
“Without this I cannot see them. They both just want hugs when we meet.”
Rachel Charlton-Dailey posted: “Free LFTs shouldn’t be ending at all, but they at least should still be available to vulnerable people and those who care for them.
“This is once again showing what this Government thinks of disabled people.”
Edwin Hayward tweeted: “Chris Whitty says he would continue to take lateral flow tests if he were in situations involving contacts with vulnerable people - but he can I assume afford to pay for them.
“It’s good to see such a responsible attitude, but it doesn’t help the millions who can’t afford LFTs.”
Twice-weekly testing for staff and students in education and childcare will end immediately, the Prime Minister confirmed on Monday.
PCR tests for most people who develop Covid symptoms will be scrapped from 1 April, as well as free LFTs for the majority of the population.
Care home residents, hospital patients and other vulnerable groups will still be given free tests if they have symptoms.
Mr Johnson said the full details of “who will continue to be entitled to free tests” will be set out in full next month.
Prof Trish Greenhalgh, primary care health expert at Oxford University, said: “This announcement is not a plan for living with Covid, it is a plan for reducing spending on testing and cutting support for people who have or may have Covid.
“Learning to live with Covid does not mean pretending it isn’t highly prevalent or pretending the virus is no longer dangerous.”
Prof Christina Pagel, of University College London, said: “Removing self isolation requirements, financial support for self-isolation and free testing will disproportionately affect more deprived communities.
“People within those communities will be less able to afford testing, less able to afford to isolate and more likely to work outside the home and so potentially infect others.
“Combined with higher rates of existing health conditions and lower rates of vaccination, this is likely to lead to significantly higher burden of Covid and its consequences in these communities compared to the least deprived.”
Health Secretary Sajid Javid said: "If NHS staff need tests they will be provided with free tests - that will be a decision for the NHS.
"Even before Covid, the NHS has always sensibly made a decision on tests and keeping their staff safe, because keeping staff safe means keeping their patients safe and it's always about patient safety."
