We want to see “test, test, test” – not delay, delay, delay

The end of April came and went, sadly with too little focus on Matt Hancock’s promised 100,000 coronavirus tests a day by the end of the month. Granted, on the last day the Health Secretary claimed to have delivered 122,000 tests. But by May 3rd, the number was back down to 76,500.

The latest figure is short of both the target and the actual testing capacity of the country. Why has the government not been able to reach 100,000 tests per day, and why is it not using all the testing capacity?

After all, the UK does not lack cases, nor does the country have a shortage of trained workers or reagents. Here are three key ways in which this government is failing our country in handling this situation.

It’s taking too long to implement.

The fact of the matter is that this government initially decided to centralise all of its laboratory testing in a few large hubs without fully risk assessing or evaluating the impact properly. That was – and remains – completely reckless. What we have now seen is that this has taken longer to set up due to logistical complications that using local testing centres would not have caused.

Local authorities working with their local NHS counterparts are perfectly placed to step into this space and resolve the problem quickly. Instead, we now have a government determined to turn to the private sector – in Deloitte, Palantir and others – bypassing our very own expertise in the process.

This is nothing more than the Tories once again attempting to press ahead with their privatisation ideology, at a time when the country is looking the other way and there is less scrutiny. It is our job in opposition to continue to put up this challenge and hold this government to account.

There is a failure to coordinate the use of resources.

It is now obvious that the government has failed to use all the resources available to ramp up its testing capacity. As opposition MPs, we are still unclear as to why that is the case – despite numerous and repeated attempts by myself and colleagues to get answers. I understand, for example, that Hancock’s team decided not to buy foreign-approved saliva test kits that could have eventually supplied the UK with 50,000 test kits a day.

We have some of the best laboratories in the world, yet the government chose to centralise testing. This has left most research laboratories are empty, with trained staff furloughed, while care home workers are being asked to travel hundreds of miles to be tested.

Even the hugely successful NHS coronavirus volunteer pool is reporting that most volunteers have never been called on. As a result, many frontline NHS staff and care workers have even been actively discouraged from getting tested. This is simply unacceptable and, again, nothing short of reckless. Our care workers and NHS deserve better than this.

We’ve seen delay, delay, delay, instead of test, test, test.

It is obvious that this government dithered and delayed at the outset. By its own admission, the initial focus was entirely on ‘delay’. This, as we now know, resulted in critical delays in implementing testing and contact-tracing programmes. Only now is there a serious attempt to ramp up contact tracing.

Countless times we have heard from Hancock and his team that they have listened to the scientists and experts. Why then have they ignored world leading experts at the World Health Organisation, who have been saying from the start that countries need to “test, test, test”?

Our government instead focused on delay, attempting to mitigate the spread of the virus and failing. Other countries were continuing to test and trace while implementing physical distancing and lockdowns. This is precisely how South Korea was able to dramatically reduce its case numbers.

Let’s think carefully. We have spent over a month in lockdown, and we are still seeing a high number of cases and fatalities on a daily basis. Now Boris Johnson is talking about easing lockdown and reopening the country, but it is not being clear what these measures will include, or what impact assessment has been done to determine whether these actions will be enough to help stop the spread of the virus.

My fear is that Johnson and Hancock have learned nothing from just over a month ago. I have said many times that with a high level of Covid-19 cases, the role of public health is and will be of utmost importance. Now is the time to engage fully in the development of a comprehensive strategy for social care, and to ensure that local public health functions have the resources that they need to get the job done.