The severe weaknesses of England’s coronavirus testing system have been exposed by data showing a sharp reduction in the number of people receiving positive results quickly.
At the start of September before schools reopened, 63 per cent of people in England who tested positive received their results by the end of the day after they had taken the test, according to data from the government’s Covid-19 dashboard.
But by Tuesday that figure had dropped to just 8 per cent.
Swift processing of test results is key to stopping the spread of the virus because people who test positive can immediately quarantine themselves, reducing the likelihood that they infect others.
The collapse in testing speeds, which was first reported by statistician Chris Drake, comes amid an uptick in coronavirus cases.
On Tuesday, half of those receiving a positive result in England had taken the test at least three days earlier. For a quarter of the cases, the results took four days or more to come.
Delays are likely to increase further after the government’s decision to prioritise testing for NHS workers, patients and those in care homes.
On Wednesday, Prime Minister Boris Johnson acknowledged that in recent days, there had been a sharp rise in demand for tests. “I think everybody can see just in the last few days, a colossal spike in the number of people who want tests and who want to ascertain whether they have got coronavirus,” he said.
He defended the government’s record, arguing that ministers and officials were trying to “meet demand at record speed” and that the majority of people were able to access tests.
“Eighty-nine per cent of those who have tests — in person tests — get them the next day and we are working very fast to turn around all the test requests that we get,” he said.
“We have conducted more tests than any other European country and that is why we are able to deliver tests as I say and deliver results in 80 per cent of the cases where we know the contacts.”
The widening gap between the date positive results were reported publicly and the dates the tests were taken might be caused by increased reporting delays to the government's dashboard. But the Department of Health did not say there were such problems.
It said the latest figures from NHS Test and Trace also showed a much faster turnround time for “in person” tests.
The NHS figures, however, are out of date. They relate to the week ending September 2, when the official data on positive tests also showed the system working well. These statistics quoted by Mr Johnson also showed that the majority of tests were not “in person” and the proportion of people getting tests the next day was just 44 per cent of all coronavirus tests in that week.
Matt Hancock, health secretary, admitted on Tuesday that the testing system faced “operational challenges” which would take “weeks” to resolve.
The NHS admitted last week that turnround times for the majority of tests, which are taken at satellite testing centres or via home-delivered kits, were “getting longer” and took on average 80 hours to deliver a result — double the time in early July.
Mr Hancock conceded there was a shortage of tests, that the government was having to prioritise those working in the health system for tests and that members of the public often had to travel miles to be tested.
This is now showing up in the daily data released by the government on caseloads, which are increasingly being reported as positive samples taken from many days before being reported.
In an interview with BBC Radio 4’s Today programme, former health secretary Jeremy Hunt defended the government’s record on testing but said the return of schools and office working had placed pressure on the system.
“The root cause, and what is different between now and what was happening in July and August is that everyone is trying to get back to work and kids are in school,” he said. “What is happening now is that if one person gets the virus in an office, then the office manager is trying to get everyone in the office tested.”
Mr Hunt acknowledged the importance of mass testing. “It is totally reasonable when you have a virus which the majority of people don’t show symptoms [of], for people to be very keen to get tested as quickly as they can.”
When challenged at prime minister’s questions by Labour’s Angela Rayner on care worker pay and testing capacity within the sector, Mr Johnson said the government was working hard to protect care home residents and staff.
“We are concerned about the rates of infections within care homes, clearly they have come down massively since we introduced the £600m care home action plan, tomorrow we will be announcing a further winter care home action plan,” he said.
Mr Johnson said the government wanted to see “a toughening up of the rules governing the movement of workers from one care home to another, we want to make sure we protect care homes from further infections”.
https://news.google.com/__i/rss/rd/articles/CBMiP2h0dHBzOi8vd3d3LmZ0LmNvbS9jb250ZW50L2FiMDA2Y2EzLWJkNGYtNDllZi1hMjQ4LTI3NjM4MTI3NmQ3NtIBP2h0dHBzOi8vYW1wLmZ0LmNvbS9jb250ZW50L2FiMDA2Y2EzLWJkNGYtNDllZi1hMjQ4LTI3NjM4MTI3NmQ3Ng?oc=5
2020-09-16 14:42:00Z
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