Test, Trace, Protect to be extended until March next year

WALES’ Test, Trace, Protect service will be extended until next year following a further injection of funding, it has been announced.

The Welsh Government has confirmed it will invest a further £32m into the service, which has helped to reduce the spread of coronavirus, so it can run until March 2022.

Latest figures show that almost a year after TTP was launched in Wales, contact tracers have reached 99.7% of the positive cases that were eligible for follow-up.

They successfully contacted almost 95% of the close contacts that were eligible for follow-up, and provided them with advice, or helped to resolve their cases.

Local authorities have also approved more than 12,500 self-isolation support payments to help people to stay at home and reduce the risk of coronavirus spreading in their local communities.

Health and Social Services Minister Eluned Morgan said: “Test, Trace, Protect has been extremely effective at supporting people who have tested positive and their contacts to isolate and providing advice, guidance and support. It is critical to stopping the virus spreading in our communities.

“It’s a year since we set up Test, Trace, Protect from scratch – at what the Auditor General for Wales described as an extraordinary scale and at pace.

“A great deal of hard work across NHS Wales, local authorities, the voluntary sector and partner organisations has created a highly effective programme to help us keep Wales safe. Everyone involved can be extremely proud of their efforts.

“I want to thank everyone involved, including Public Health Wales and Digital Health Care Wales. In particular I want to thank the contact tracers and those providing protect services who have provided much-needed support to people at an extremely difficult time in their lives.

“They have done much more than their title suggests – they have identified vulnerable people and got them extra support, whether that be someone to chat to, a food parcel, or linking in with vital mental health services.

“As we seek to stop the spread of new variants of concern, experienced contact tracers are key to doing this and we are continuing to invest in this work.”