Pre-school Education: Coronavirus

(asked on 20th January 2021) - View Source

Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what progress his Department has made on introducing regular rapid covid-19 testing for (a) nursery workers, (b) childminders and (c) other early years professionals.


Answered by
Nick Gibb Portrait
Nick Gibb
This question was answered on 25th January 2021

The Department is continuing to work closely with colleagues across government and local authorities to secure the most effective approach to asymptomatic testing for the whole of the early years sector.

We are rolling out our asymptomatic testing programme to primary schools with deliveries of test kits starting from week commencing 18 January 2021.

The asymptomatic testing programme will offer all primary school, schools based nursery and maintained nursery school staff home Lateral Flow Device test kits for twice weekly testing. This will help to break the chains of transmission of COVID-19 in schools and nurseries by identifying asymptomatic positive cases. Those who test positive will then self-isolate, helping to reduce transmission of the virus.

Community Testing programmes are currently being rolled out across the country. Local authorities will be encouraged to target testing to people who cannot work from home during lockdown. Further information can be found here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/community-testing-explainer/community-testing-a-guide-for-local-delivery.

Early years staff, as critical workers, continue to have priority access to the Department of Health and Social Care led symptomatic PCR testing via the online portal: https://www.gov.uk/guidance/coronavirus-covid-19-getting-tested.

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