Asked by: Greg Clark (Conservative - Tunbridge Wells)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what estimate he has made of when covid-19 testing capacity will be sufficient to allow the testing of all travellers to and from the UK.
Answered by Helen Whately - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
Our primary focus is symptomatic people to ensure that everyone who needs a test can get one, therefore NHS Test and Trace tests are not currently available for testing to reduce the self-isolation period for international arrivals. National Health Service testing capacity is reserved for testing symptomatic people in the United Kingdom, with any spare capacity being used to where most clinically effective.
Work is ongoing with clinicians, the devolved administrations and the travel industry to consider if and how testing could be used to reduce the self-isolation period, but any potential change would need to minimise the chance that positive cases are missed, and maximise compliance with self-isolation rules.
Asked by: Greg Clark (Conservative - Tunbridge Wells)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps he is taking to introduce regular covid-19 testing for asymptomatic domiciliary care workers.
Answered by Helen Whately - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
Asymptomatic testing for domiciliary care workers (also known as home care workers) will be guided by the results from the Public Health England prevalence study into domiciliary care. This study found that COVID-19 prevalence among domiciliary care workers was similar to prevalence in the general population. We are currently reviewing the implications for asymptomatic testing in domiciliary care.