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WRONG The shortage of Covid tests across the country has thrown the Operation Moonshot plan of ten million swabs a day into chaos.
Huge lines formed at the test centers as MPs called the system a “bloody disaster.”
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Swabs for many were rationed when Health Secretary Matt Hancock admitted that the crisis will last into winter.
No evidence was available in 46 of 48 of the country’s worst hotspots as the fiasco raged.
Sites in Southend, Bury, Birmingham, and Manchester were overwhelmed with families desperately trying to obtain exams that would allow them to return to work or school.
Health Secretary Matt Hancock admitted that the crippling shortage will last into winter.
And now a backlog of 240,000 tests has accumulated that will not be removed until well into the fall or beyond, when millions of people will be at risk of coronavirus-like cold and flu symptoms.
The collapse of the system has also left doctors, nurses, nursing home residents and teachers unable to be tested for the killer virus.
It comes days after Downing Street committed to Operation Moonshot.
Under the ambitious plan, up to ten million people a day would be screened by a new type of test that would yield immediate results, such as a pregnancy test.
But this test has yet to be developed, making ministers dependent on existing tests, which can take up to a week to return results.
The strain on the system has been caused by a sharp increase in people seeking evidence.
Follow the national return to schools and the concerns of students, parents and teachers. Ineligible individuals have also been misusing the system.
Ministers have urged the public to be sensible and swab only if you have symptoms to help ease the crisis.
Hancock was forced to restrict testing to hospital patients, nursing home residents, and key workers, saying, “I don’t sidestep decisions on prioritization.
“They are not always comfortable, but they are important.
“We will establish an updated prioritization and I do not rule out additional steps to ensure that our tests are used in accordance with those priorities.”
Angry MPs called the system a “bloody mess” after queues snaked outside the testing centers.
Hundreds of people lined up in a walk-in drive in Southend, Essex, but tests had reportedly been sold out by 10 a.m.
Dozens of residents were unable to obtain samples at the Gorton, Manchester facility.
Sites in Bury and Sutton Coldfield were also overwhelmed
In Abercynon, South Wales, officials turned away cars from as far away as Essex, London and Brighton.
A health worker at the scene said: “The poor wretches looked devastated when they arrived. Some of the long distance carriers also hadn’t made an appointment, so we couldn’t test them. “
Mahmoon Rasheed, 34, from Nottingham, was forced to book a test in Edinburgh for his daughter Husnah, 8, after she developed mild symptoms of coronavirus and her school advised her and her siblings to isolate themselves.
He said, “I took a space hundreds of miles away. It is important that I send my children to school after six months of absence. ”In Cambridge, locals complained of being forced to drive hundreds of miles for a test while a local center is empty.
Hancock insisted he was optimistic and revealed that experts were working on technology that could speed up test results.
More than 200,000 are processed daily, and nursing homes consume about half. Capacity is expected to increase to 500,000 per day by the end of October.
But a government source said he will not be able to offer a check to everyone who wants one for “a long time.”
Experts said the labs were working well. One suggested that there are “clearly underlying issues that nobody wants to talk to us about.” Conservative MP Jason McCartney told ministers that they should have solved the evidence that existed before Operation Moonshot.
And parent group Netmums warned that families are at a “breaking point” due to the testing fiasco.
Professor James Naismith, director of the Rosalind Franklin Institute, said: “The increase in cases that we have seen and the imposition of a rule of six, is precisely what an effective system of test, trace and isolation with health measures should have avoided public “.
The Department of Health and Welfare said: “NHS Test and Trace is working, we are processing over a million tests a week, but we are seeing significant demand for tests, even from people who have no symptoms and are not eligible. Our goal is testability in the areas that need it most. “
Parents and students suffer
By Steve Chalke, founder of the Oasis Trust, which runs 52 schools
I HAD a single mother who called me crying and told me how her son had contracted all the symptoms of the coronavirus.
He can’t go back to school for two weeks, so she can’t go to work and that means she has no money.
He called the Covid-19 NHS testing center numerous times and when he finally managed to get through they told him to go online. He spent most of Saturday trying to make the site work. It was not so.
He got up earlier Sunday, still without joy.
From the comments on Facebook, he realized that this was very common, so he finally gave up.
Once this mother, who lives in South London, got a place in a testing center, she was miles from home and she doesn’t have a car.
This story is repeating itself across the country for both staff and students, not just in the 52 Oasis Trust schools, but in thousands of others.
With just over six days into the new school year, we’ve had to send 1,200 out of 31,500 students home. The reason is that students or teachers have symptoms and cannot return until they have a negative test result.
At Waterloo, London, we have 12 teachers absent due to a staff member showing symptoms. They cannot be tested.
As a result, following government policy, two year-round groups are out and 240 children are missing their education. It is time for regular Covid-19 testing on site in all schools, because we cannot allow students and staff to travel miles to collect samples. And those results must be quick.
In other countries, results are obtained in 24 hours, which is what is necessary. You need to evaluate all school personnel and children all the time.
Without that, we have chaos.
As winter approaches, more and more students and staff will have coughs and colds.
It is not possible for them to be out of school for two weeks at a time.
The country is losing control of the virus, let us not also lose control of our education.
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