Bargainers: Bipartisan deal near on $10B new COVID package

Lawmakers seemed on the brink of clinching a bipartisan compromise Thursday to provide a fresh $10 billion to combat COVID-19, a deal that could set up final congressional approval next week.

The price tag was a reduction from an earlier $15.6 billion compromise that fell apart weeks ago after House Democrats rejected cuts in pandemic aid to states to help pay for it. With leaders hoping to move the package through Congress quickly, the lowered price tag seemed to reflect both parties concluding that finding additional savings soon would be too hard.

The new money would be to purchase vaccines, treatments and tests, which the administration says are running low, even as the more transmissible omicron variant BA.2 spreads quickly in the U.S. and abroad.