UK ‘weeks’ away from crucial location-tracking coronavirus strategy needed to end blockade

The UK is “weeks away” from successfully implementing a crucial coronavirus tracking and tracing strategy needed to end the blockade, it is claimed.

It occurs when a new study argues that extensive contact monitoring and isolation are the key to controlling the spread of the coronavirus, according to a new study published today.

The government is trying to emulate South Korea and Germany to get new patients, while eliminating the chains of contagion, with 18,000 volunteer ‘trackers’ on board.

But Britain is still struggling to reduce the number of infected people to 100,000 for the plan to work effectively, The Sun reports.

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The tracker at King’s College London has the figure more than three times that, at 350,000, implying that the Cabinet will extend the blockade beyond May 7.

A Westminster source told the newspaper that “both the rate of reproduction and the actual level of infection must be dramatically reduced.”

“Although the rate of R is below one, we have a way to go in general numbers.

“We need to reduce the infection pool to around 100,000 live cases before we can control it with tracking and localization and NHS application,” they added.

The Sun also reports that an environmental health professional who signed up to be a tracker has not yet been contacted to begin the training.

It comes as the government admits that much work remains to be done to reach its test target of 100,000 a day by the end of the month, but the figures are “overall where they are expected to be,” said Health Secretary Matt Hancock.

The government has been under increasing pressure in recent days to meet the target in late April, with just 37,024 tests conducted on Sunday.

It came after the Prime Minister’s spokesman had previously said it would be “difficult to know” whether the objective of the coronavirus test had been reached.

Researchers have found that tracing contacts to quickly isolate people who might be infected with the disease reduced the time people were infectious in the community.

The study, published in the journal Lancet Infectious Diseases, was based on an analysis of 391 coronavirus cases and 1,286 of their close contacts in Shenzhen, China, over four weeks between January 14 and February 12.

He found that contact tracing increased the rate at which new cases were confirmed in two days from an average of 5.5 days to 3.2 days with contact tracing.

Tracking contacts also cut the amount of time it took to isolate infected people by nearly two days, from an average of 4.6 days to 2.7, according to the study.

Dr. Ting Ma of the Harbin Institute of Technology in Shenzhen said: “Covid-19’s experience in Shenzhen City can demonstrate the large scale testing and contact tracing that is needed to reduce the spread of the virus.

“Some of the stringent control measures applied here, such as isolating people outside their homes, are unlikely to be replicated elsewhere, but we urge governments to consider our findings in the global response to Covid-19.

“To achieve similar results, other countries could combine near-universal testing and intensive contact tracing with social distancing and partial blockages.”

The study was conducted by researchers at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, the Shenzhen Center for Disease Control and Prevention, the Harbin Institute of Technology in Shenzhen, and the Peng Cheng Laboratory, Shenzhen.

He said that in Shenzhen, people with symptoms were isolated and treated in hospital before their test results were known, and those without symptoms were quarantined in dedicated facilities.

Close contacts who tested negative were quarantined at home or in a dedicated facility and monitored for 14 days, he added.

The study authors analyzed data from 391 people diagnosed with Covid-19 after they showed symptoms and 1,286 from their close contacts, people who shared a home with infected patients up to two days before they started showing symptoms or socially interacted with them traveling. or eating. together.

Contacts were tested regardless of whether they had symptoms to identify infected individuals who were asymptomatic.

The study found that one-fifth of people diagnosed with Covid-19 after being tracked by contract, 17 out of 87, had not developed any symptoms and 30% had no fever.

While the length of time a person remains infectious is still unknown, reducing the amount of time infected people interacted with others appears to have helped reduce the spread of the virus, according to the study.

He also said that transmission was more likely among people who shared a home, but that not all close contacts caught Covid-19, and only 11% of close contacts of this type developed the disease.

Of the close contacts who traveled together with an infected person, an average of 6% developed the disease, while 9% of those who shared a meal with an infected person contracted coronavirus.

The authors emphasized that the data gave no insight into why some cases cause higher levels of transmission than others.

They also highlight several limitations to their study, including the fact that it is impossible to track every potential contact an individual has, and therefore contact tracking focuses on close contacts who are most likely to be infected.