Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what plans the Government has to test, track and trace people infected with covid-19.

We are developing an integrated contact tracing and testing programme to support the next phase of our COVID-19 response. The programme will combine innovative technology, an app which uses Bluetooth technology to detect proximity contacts between app users, with more traditional web and phone-based contact tracing techniques. Alongside this there will be swab testing for those reporting COVID-19 symptoms.

The contact tracing app is currently undergoing testing and we are recruiting 18,000 contact tracers to support the wider programme. This integrated programme will play an important role in helping us to minimise the spread of the virus in the future.