The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) announced that their Round 2 COVID-19 Telehealth Program portal will open on April 29. 

Congress initially funded the COVID-19 telehealth program in the CARES Act. In the first round, FCC will have distributed $200 million to reimburse telehealth programs run by 539 organizations throughout the US. In the Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2021, Congress added an additional $249.95 million to fund the second round of financial support for telehealth initiatives by health care providers around the country.

The FCC's focus is on funding applicants from healthcare provider shortage areas, low-income and tribal communities, and regions hardest hit by the COVID-19 pandemic. In this new funding round, the agency will also consider applications tied to organizations that went unfunded during the first round.

The FCC intends to assure that at least one organization from each state and territory receives telehealth funding from one of the two program funding rounds.