Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, if he will ensure that people who have recently been in contact with women at Yarl's Wood Immigration Removal Centre who have become infected with covid-19 will be tested for that disease.
NHS England and NHS Improvement have advised that COVID-19 testing is only routinely being carried out on symptomatic patients arriving at hospital.
This is in line with NHS England and NHS Improvement national policy to utilise tests and laboratory capacity for urgent hospitalised patients. The Government has confirmed a major national effort to boost testing capacity. With a focus on ensuring the highest priority cases are tested first, officials are working to rapidly increase the number of tests that can be conducted by Public Health England and the National Health Service in laboratories, with the expected surge in capacity ready within four weeks.