On January 9, the Central Epidemic Command Center (CECC) announced that the seventh round of the government's program to provide a pack of five free rapid test kits to each child aged six or under (born on or after September 2, 2016), and the fifth round of the program to offer five rapid tests to each elderly person aged 65 or older (born in 1958 or earlier) will begin starting from January 10 to February 28. Additionally, to protect the health of disadvantaged groups and people with mental or physical disabilities, the CECC will provide government-funded rapid tests to disadvantaged people (those from low-income and lower-middle income families, and homeless people) as well as individuals with disability identification cards/certificates starting January 12 through February 15. Each eligible person will be able to receive four rapid tests.

Elderly people, aged 65 and over, as well as parents of young children, aged 6 and under, can pick up a set of five test kits, free of charge, at designated distribution sites under the name-based rapid test distribution scheme. Free rapid test kits claimed under these programs will not be counted as the number of test kits an individual can buy under the name-based scheme.

The CECC explained that the last day for collecting free rapid tests for children 6 years of age and under in the sixth round and for elderly people 65 years of age and older in the fourth round is today; those who fail to collect free rapid tests within time cannot collect their unclaimed rapid tests starting tomorrow.