Covid tests halted at facility where blunder missed 43,000 cases

The UK Health Security Agency faces questions after ‘strange’ PCR results were identified weeks ago

BRITAIN’S testing programme was in disarray last night after it emerged that 43,000 people who were probably infected with Covid-19 were given the all clear, causing a spike in cases.

The UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) was facing questions about how it missed the testing blunder when it had been spotted more than a month ago by scientists and amateur data analysts.

Yesterday NHS Test and Trace suspended operations at the Immensa Health Clinic laboratory in Wolverhampton, after it emerged that people had received negative PCR test results despite previously testing positive with lateral flow devices.

Experts warned the error would likely lead to tens of thousands more infections, as well as more hospital admissions and deaths, because huge numbers of people did not self-isolate.

Dr Kit Yates, of the University of Bath’s Department of Mathematical Sciences, said there had been a “concerted effort” among experts to highlight the “strange results” but little had been done until recently.

“People have been gaslighted into thinking they haven’t got Covid and they have been going into schools and offices and potentially infecting tens of thousands of other people,” he said.

“We should have been getting people to isolate but without PCR you can’t convince your boss you need to isolate and PCR has been put on this pedestal and thought to be always better than lateral flow.

“It will lead to a spike in cases, and we’re already seeing that in places like Stroud. Currently we’re seeing rising cases in children but that is now starting to bleed through to older age ranges so this will impact on hospitalisations and deaths a few weeks down the line.”

The errors relate to test results given to people between Sept 8 and Oct 12, mainly in South West England, but with some cases in the South East and Wales.

In early September, scientists and data analysts pointed out that case numbers in the South West seemed artificially low, and noticed that unusually high numbers of positive lateral flow tests were coming back negative when checked against the gold-standard polymerase chain reaction (PCR).

The Office for National Statistics’ infection survey had also recorded surging cases in the South West, even though it was not apparent from the Government’s daily coronavirus dashboard.

It is the first crisis for the UKHSA, which has recently replaced Public Health England after that organisation was criticised for its early handling of mass testing in the pandemic.

Jenny Harries, chief executive of the UKHSA, told the BBC that “feedback” and “queries” about testing issues had been coming through over the past two or three weeks from public health directors in the South West.

She admitted, however, that it was only in the past few days that they had “dug right down” into the geography and discovered the testing discrepancies. She said it was not yet clear what went wrong in the private laboratory, adding that it was accredited “to all of the appropriate standards”.

The Government awarded Immensa a £119 million contract in October 2020 to urgently “develop volume for PCR testing for Covid in line with test and trace requirements”, the contract shows. However, an investigation by The Sun newspaper back in January, showed workers fighting, drinking alcohol, playing football and sleeping in the Wolverhampton laboratory.

Andrea Riposati, chief executive of Immensa, is also chief executive of Dante laboratories which is under investigation by the Competition and

Markets Authority for issues including the failure to deliver PCR tests or results on time.

Prof Adam Finn, of the University of Bristol, a member of the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation, said that his team had flagged the issue to the director of public health in Bristol several weeks ago.

“This was not an invisible problem,” he said. “A number of people have been puzzled by getting positive lateral flow tests and then [a] negative PCR.

“This has been around for two or three weeks. We have been aware of it and warned about it.

“How did it take a month to notice? In my lab we would notice immediately if there was a problem.

“There are questions that need to be answered. We need reassurance that it won’t happen again.”

NHS Test and Trace is contacting people who could still be infectious to advise them to take another test along with close contacts who are symptomatic, as is already recommended.

However, because of the delay, it is most likely only a few thousand of the 43,000 affected are still infectious, Dr Harries said.

Tim Barton, 48, said he and his family received positive lateral flow tests after falling ill with coronavirus symptoms earlier this month but their PCR tests came back negative.

He said: “My son, daughter and myself all had positive [lateral flow] tests – we then had PCR tests done at the test site in Swindon all of which came back negative.

“This will undoubtedly impact people’s confidence in the accuracy of these types of tests … they could have cost lives.”

Graham Loader also said his family had three positive lateral flow tests, all followed by negative PCR tests taken at the screening site at Newbury Showground, Berkshire.

His wife, a schoolteacher, returned to work after a negative PCR test.

Mr Loader, who coaches a boy’s football team, said: “I completely trusted

‘This will impact on hospitals and deaths weeks down the line’

the PCR, so I feel bad for all the people I’ve been in contact with.”

The issue was first noticed in early September when scientists and data analysts on social media realised that cases in the South West had started to plummet.

Local authorities that had been experiencing worrying hotspots, suddenly saw case rates drop to a tenth of the previous number in just a fortnight. Experts said it was unusual because such dramatic falls did not even happen in areas of self-limiting outbreaks, such as in factories or prisons.

Dave Mcnally, who was watching the data closely, pointed out the strange numbers on Twitter, posting a graph which showed that PCR testing had “pretty much halved” in the space of

seven days between Sept 9-16. He told The Daily Telegraph: “A few of us noticed on September 10 that something wasn’t right in the number from September 8.

“By September 20 it looked clear to me that PCR samples were going wrong in some way.”

While the west of the country had been responsible for roughly 6 per cent of England’s daily case numbers since the start of August, overnight it dropped below 3 per cent during mid to late September.

Although case rates rose back to normal level towards the end of September, by the beginning of October the numbers were falling suspiciously again.

In early October, members of the public began to report that despite having symptoms of Covid and multiple positive lateral flow tests, they were still being told they did not have the virus.

It was around this time that news of a “super cold” emerged, with people claiming to feel dreadful, yet testing negative for coronavirus.

When the social media analysts began looking at the test results more closely, they realised something very odd was happening.

Normally, because of the delay in

PCR test data coming back from laboratories the daily specimen count is low and is revised up as more results are returned. It is usually completed five days later.

However, in nine areas of the South West, the opposite was happening. The figures were being revised down.

What became clear was that large numbers of lateral flow positives were being removed from the figures.

Latest data from the infection survey show that the South West is now one of the worst areas in the country for Covid cases, most likely driven by the cases that were not picked up.