Sunderland Echo

Covid-19 tracers miss one third of contacts

- Alex Ross echo.news@jpimedia.co.uk @sunderland­echo

Nearly a third of close contacts of people with coronaviru­s are still not being reached by the test and trace system in Sunderland, new figures suggest.

D ata f ro m th e D e pa r tment for Health and Social care shows 12,371 people who tested positive for Covid-19 in the city were transferre­d to the national Test and Trace service between May 28 and December 30 – 878 new cases in the last week of that time.

This led to 24,606 close contacts being identified – with 68.4% being reached – meaning that 7,783 people were either not contacted or did not respond.

T h at f i g u re wa s a n i mp rove m e nt o n th e 6 6. 8 % reached in the period to December 23.

Nationally, 92.3% of contacts were reached and told to self-isolate by NHS Test and Trace in the week to December 30.

Local health protection teams reached 99.8 per cent of contacts of cases managed by them in the week to 30 December.

Cllr Ian Hudspeth, chairman of the Local Government A s s o c i at io n’s C o m mu n i ty Wellbeing Board, said: “With d a i l y i n f e c t i o n r at e s a n d deaths from coronaviru­s at their highest ever level, we urgently need to be picking up as many contacts of people who test positive, as quickly as possible.

“Councils know their communitie­s best, with nearly nine in 10 setting up contact tracing teams to work with the national system and successful­ly find many hard-toreach cases.

“But th ey n e e d g reate r support and better and faster informatio­n on who they should be trying to contact.”

 ??  ?? The test and trace system is missing close contacts.
The test and trace system is missing close contacts.
 ??  ?? Cllr Ian Hudspeth.
Cllr Ian Hudspeth.

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