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According to the government, there are now 43 regional test sites across the UK.
Coronavirus testing is available to millions more people in England starting today after the government loosened the rules on who can apply.
Expanded eligibility now means nursing home residents and staff with or without symptoms can request tests.
While people over 65 and anyone who must leave home to go to work can now book a test if they have symptoms.
No. 10 aims to reach its goal of 100,000 tests per day by Thursday, with just over 43,000 as of Monday.
Expanding eligibility beyond essential workers and hospital patients means 25 million people can now book
the government trial booking website
, the test coordinator, Professor John Newton, told the BBC Radio 4 Today program.
Coronavirus symptoms
includes a new persistent dry cough, and fever or elevated temperature above 37.8C
.
Testing capacity has now increased to 73,400 per day, according to Downing Street, though home test kits and appointments at regional centers in Wales sold out about an hour after Wednesday’s slot machines were put into March at 08:00 BST.
But the differences between the UK nations in the tests emerged as Wales
said he would not follow England when evaluating care home residents and staff
showing no symptoms
Who can be tested in England?
- Hospital patients suspected of having Covid-19
- All those who work in the front line in health and social care (with or without symptoms)
- NHS patients and nursing home residents (with or without symptoms)
- All other essential workers with symptoms.
- Anyone over 65 with symptoms.
- Anyone who goes to work because they cannot work from home (for example, construction workers) and have symptoms
- Anyone who has symptoms and lives with someone who meets any of the above criteria.
Source: SM Government
It occurs as the government prepares to publish updated figures for coronavirus deaths, including for the first time in the community, such as in nursing homes.
Data from the National Statistics Office released Wednesday showed
A third of all coronavirus deaths in England and Wales are now occurring in nursing homes, according to reports until April 17.
“We will implement tests of asymptomatic residents and staff in nursing homes in England” – Matt Hancock
First Secretary of State and Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab said Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s 250,000 daily tests remained “an aspiration”, in response to questions from Labor Party leader Sir Keir Starmer in the Commons .
Raab said that while the quarter-million target was still in place, it would not confirm when it would be reached.
He added: “The key point is that the 100,000th milestone is just the first stepping stone to testing, which is essential for the broader testing, tracking and tracing regimen we will need as we transition to the second phase (of combat the epidemic). ”
Johnson lost the prime minister’s questions
after he and his fiancé Carrie Symonds announced the birth of a healthy baby in London
.
Test eligibility criteria vary across the UK.
In Scotland,
Prime Minister Nicola Sturgeon said
All patients over the age of 70 who are admitted to the hospital for any reason will now be screened for Covid-19.
In Northern Ireland
tests have started in some GP practices
and it will also be expanded in hospitals and residences.
Regional coronavirus testing sites have been established throughout the UK.
Wales has adopted
A needs-based testing approach
for the NHS and “critical” non-NHS workers, but Health Minister Vaughn Gething said the country
would not deploy tests to care for household residents and staff who show no symptoms
, unlike England.
In addition to civil evidence,
More than 800 sailors have been tested aboard the HMS Queen Elizabeth aircraft carrier
, and its departure from the dock has been delayed.
‘Massive expansion in testing’
This represents a massive expansion of who is eligible for the test, and means that we are now one step away from allowing everyone to access a test if they have symptoms.
That will be crucial when blocking restrictions are eased as part of the “test, track and trace” strategy to keep the coronavirus at bay.
This is possible thanks to the deployment of test kits in the home and mobile units with personnel from the armed forces.
The problems experienced in getting more people to test have been, to some extent, because the network of driving test centers has not always been in convenient locations.
There is a large laboratory capacity to process the tests now that all three mega laboratories are operating in Milton Keynes, Glasgow and Cheshire.
The expansion also allowed the government to do something that could be crucial in dealing with the epidemic in nursing homes: testing for residents and staff without symptoms.
A major concern is that the virus has been able to establish itself in care homes through people who transmit it before they have symptoms or are asymptomatic.
But promising something is one thing, giving it up is another.
While it looks like the capacity will be there to test 100,000 a day by the end of the month, the numbers that are actually being tested are currently less than half.
‘Transparency’
Meanwhile, data from the Office for National Statistics showed there were 2,000 home deaths from coronavirus care in England and Wales in the week ending April 17, double that of the previous week.
The total number of deaths in nursing homes related to the virus since the start of the pandemic increases to 3,096.
Deaths from coronavirus in hospitals across the UK have reached 21,678.
The health secretary said that starting Wednesday the government will publish daily figures on deaths in nursing homes and the community.
He said the change was aimed at “bringing as much transparency as possible” to the numbers and “increasing our understanding of how this virus is spreading from day to day.”
In other developments:
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