Western Daily Press (Saturday)
People in West taking Covid tests in Welsh lockdown area
PEOPLE in parts of the West have been left angered at having to cross the Welsh border for a Covid-19 test in a county that is in lockdown.
Some 240,000 people in Rhondda Cynon Taff (RCT) are affected by the tough new measures following a rapid rise in coronavirus cases.
Nobody is allowed to enter or leave the area without reasonable excuse after the restrictions were brought in at 6pm on Thursday.
But people from Weston-superMare, Taunton and Cirencester said that the only place they could book a test on Thursday was in the village of Abercynon, where cases are surging.
Many have slammed the testing regime as a “shambles” and a huge number of people queuing for tests at a centre expressly set up for residents in the South Wales borough were from England, Channel 4 News reports.
One woman from Weston-superMare told the programme: “Two days trying to book a test and this was the only place - it’s terrible when you’re trying to get your kids tested, for other people’s safety, and nobody knows what they’re doing.”
A care worker from Gloucestershire, who did not give her name, travelled to Abercynon with her two elderly parents who have been displaying coronavirus symptoms since the weekend.
She said: “They rang me on Monday saying they weren’t feeling very well after I just done three 12-hour shifts in a care home.”
Other families travelled to Wales from Cirencester and Reading while one woman, from Blakeney in Gloucestershire, added: “They said it was a drive-thru, not stand outside for an hour in the wind in an area that’s going into lockdown tonight, which I think is a little bit of a joke to be honest.”
Another woman, who did not give her name, travelled one hour and 35 minutes from Taunton for a test and is unable to go work until she receives her results.
She said: “I work with vulnerable adults so I’ve not been able to go to work and when you’re on a phone trying to book an appointment for you to get on with your life and you can’t, it’s really, really frustrating. “We are the ones being penalised giving up our time, not being able to go to work. I’ve got three small children in the car – I don’t want them stood in this queue.
“It’s not a direct message to anybody it’s just a bit of a shambles, really, isn’t it?”
The local lockdown in RCT is because of a continued and rapid increase in the number of cases, and evidence of community transmission.
Welsh health minister Vaughan Gething said the lockdown followed two “significant” clusters of Covid-19 cases in the area.