Test and trace system to start across England

PEOPLE with coronavirus will have their contacts traced from today in a bid to control the spread of Covid-19 and help ease lockdown restrictions, the Government has announced.

NHS Test and Trace will officially launch across England with the help of 25,000 contact tracers, while an accompanying app is still delayed by several weeks.

The aim of the scheme – which will run alongside calls to keep up social distancing and handwashing – is to cut off routes of transmission for coronavirus and prevent a second peak of infection.

Launching the scheme, Health and Social Care Secretary Matt Hancock said: “As we move to the next stage of our fight against coronavirus, we will be able to replace national lockdowns with individual isolation and, if necessary, local action where there are outbreaks.

“NHS Test and Trace will be vital to stopping the spread of the virus. It is how we will be able to protect our friends and family from infection, and protect our NHS.

“This new system will help us keep this virus under control while carefully and safely lifting the lockdown nationally.”

Baroness Dido Harding, executive chairwoman of NHS Test and Trace, said: “NHS test and trace is designed to enable the vast majority of us to be able to get on with our lives in a much more normal way, but it requires all of us to do our civic duty.

“We will be trading national lockdown for individual isolation if we have symptoms.

“Instead of 60 million people being in national lockdown, a much smaller number of us will be told we need to stay at home, either for seven days if we are ill or 14 days if we have been in close contact.”

Baroness Harding, who lives in Winscombe with her husband John Penrose, the MP for Weston-superMare, is the former chief executive of Talk Talk.

When she was at the helm of the company it was subject to a highprofile hacking of more than 150,000 customers’ details, which ended up costing it £77 million.

She is also a non-executive director of the Bank of England’s court of directors and chair of NHS Improvement.

The keen equestrienne owned 1998 Cheltenham Gold Cup winner Cool Dawn and now sits on the board of the Jockey Club, which owns Cheltenham Racecourse.

Under the plans, anyone with coronavirus symptoms will immediately self-isolate and book a test, preferably at a testing centre or, if necessary, for delivery to their home.

If the test proves negative, they do not need to do anything more.

But if the test is positive, NHS contact tracers or local public health teams will call them, email or send a text asking them to share details of the people they have been in close contact with and places they have visited.

The team then emails or texts those close contacts, telling them they must stay home for 14 days even if they have no symptoms, to avoid unknowingly spreading the virus. If the contact themselves then falls ill, they book themselves a test.

Coronavirus tests can be booked at nhs.uk/coronavirus or by calling 119.