[ad_1]
02:39
The UK government’s new contact tracing app launched in England and Wales four months after its original launch date.
The app will alert users who have spent time within two meters of someone infected with COVID-19, and will also allow them to record their symptoms and book a test. You can also recommend someone to isolate themselves and then provide a daily counter for the 14 day period.
When entering a pub, restaurant or shop, people will need to register by scanning an official NHS QR code. If they later contract the virus, the site will be alerted.
The new application has been tested in the borough of Newham, east London, and on the Isle of Wight. It is the second time the government has tested an application. The first had technical problems, but the government insists that it is now ready for a national deployment.
We can do our bit to post the NHS QR code, but you have to communicate with people to use it.
– Restaurant owner and app researcher Noor Abidin
Noor Abidin’s Malaysian restaurant in Westfield Mall has been participating in the testing of the app, but says the main problem was that very few customers had downloaded it.
“I suggest that the government be more proactive,” he told CGTN. “We can do our bit to publish the NHS QR code, but you have to communicate with people to use it.”
Many pubs and restaurants have already been using their own QR codes to track customers.
Rob Claassen from the Salisbury pub in London’s Queen’s Park says: “Most importantly, if we have any local broadcasts in the pub, we need to have the ability to contact anyone who was there that night to prevent COVID transmission. -19 “.
CLICK: SEE OUR BREAKDOWN OF THE LATEST RULES ACROSS THE CONTINENT
UK Health Secretary Matt Hancock has noted that “the app can find contacts that human contact trackers can’t, for example if you’re sitting near them on public transport.”
Critics have described the UK’s track, trace and test system as a “disaster”. Over the past two weeks, testing centers have been overwhelmed by people, and the government has admitted that it will take months to clear backlogs because labs don’t have the capacity to process all tests quickly enough.
In Newham, around 10 percent of people downloaded and used the NHS app, while in other areas uptake has been around 30 percent.
Now that the app has finally been released, the government expects people to download it in much larger quantities.
