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Pressure over testing mounts as UK website overwhelmed 


The government came under renewed pressure over its handling of coronavirus testing on Friday, as ministers were forced to apologise for closing a new online booking site within hours of its launch citing “significant demand”.

The website faced a flood of applications after ministers expanded testing to 10m workers and their families, as they race to hit a target of 100,000 tests a day by the end of April.

Downing Street said 5,000 key workers had applied for home-testing kits within two minutes of the website page launching on Friday morning. A total of 11,500 bookings for Friday appointments at drive-through testing centres were also made, according to health officials, taking the total to more than 16,000.

The health department’s apology for closing the new site came as Britain’s death toll in hospitals from coronavirus rose to 19,506, an increase of 684 on the previous 24-hour reporting period.

Grant Shapps, transport secretary, said at the daily Downing Street press briefing that 46,000 people had visited the site following its launch.

“It looks like the trajectory to 100,000 tests by the end of April is going to be met in terms of capacity,” he added. “I would say, after today, the demand is there, so if those two things come together we will have it being met.”

Test booking slots and home-testing kits will be made available from 8am each day and their release will be staggered throughout the day. There are no eligibility checks to ensure those applying for tests are key workers, but Number 10 said it expected “the public to respond in good faith”.

Chris Whitty, the UK government’s chief medical adviser, on Friday said the government’s 100,000 testing target had not been based on scientific advice, while endorsing the broader goal of an increase in testing.

Giving evidence to the Commons science and technology select committee, he was asked if the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies, which advises ministers on strategy, had recommended that figure.

He said: “Sage did not give that specific target. Sage has consistently said, and indeed I have consistently said, that one of the things we needed to do was have a greater capacity to test across the whole of the UK.”

He said Sage was developing a view about what the “optimal” maximum amount of testing should be, in terms both of antigen tests that demonstrate whether someone has Covid-19, and antibody tests that can reveal whether someone has previously suffered from it.

He went on to suggest that it might be possible for the government to relax some social distancing restrictions without jeopardising the goal of ensuring that each infected person did not pass the virus on to more than one person, the so-called “R” number that measures levels of transmission. Prof Whitty said he believed the R number was 0.5-1.

“I do not anticipate that we are suddenly going to be able to lift everything, but nor do I think it likely we will have to keep in exactly the current pattern for the indefinite future,” he said.

The public was warned to only “travel if you need to” after figures showed road transport use had risen 2-3 per cent in past week.

Mr Shapps said: “There is a danger as we go into yet another warm sunny weekend that people think that perhaps these graphs are showing that the peak is over. It isn’t over, we’re riding perhaps, we hope, a downward trend but it is by no means established yet.”

The Guardian reported on Friday that Dominic Cummings, the prime minister’s closest adviser, attended a key meeting of Sage on March 23, ahead of the lockdown. 

David King, a former chief scientific adviser to the government, told the newspaper he was “shocked” to learn a political figure had been present at meetings. 

“If you are giving science advice, your advice should be free of any political bias. That is just so critically important,” Sir David said. 

A Number 10 spokesman said it was not true that Mr Cummings or Ben Warner, a data scientist who worked on the Vote Leave Brexit campaign were “on” or were members of Sage.

“Mr Cummings and Dr Warner have attended some Sage meetings and listen to some meetings now they are all virtual,” the spokesman said. “They do this in order to understand better the scientific debates concerning this emergency and also to understand better the limits of how science and data can help government decisions.

“The scientists on Sage are among the most eminent in their fields. It is factually wrong and damaging to sensible public debate to imply their advice is affected by government advisers listening to discussions.”



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