By Anne North The government is withdrawing Covid-19 testing capacity from Cornwall and is devoting it to parts of the country where the disease is more prevalent. Cornwall Council bosses…
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You might well get a home-test kit, but laboratory analysis – and test result – for people who live in Cornwall is now at the end of the queue. Cornwall is not the only “low Covid area” affected by this new government policy and several local councils joined together on Friday to lobby Whitehall about it. Public health officials in Cornwall are furious that this does indeed make more difficult their job of nipping outbreaks in the bud. The government is promising extra laboratory analysis capacity later this year.
I’m sorry, how can it be helpful to remove our ability to be tested when it is clear that people arriving back from holidays abroad are, in some circs, bringing back covid? For those of us who live in commuter areas to Plymouth, this is a genuine concern. Surely testing enables CC to respond to small clusters before they spread into the wider community?
Please CR help me to understand the implications, for instance if I have symptoms and want to be tested in Cornwall today, can I receive a home test and get the results? Or are you saying that if I rang 111 and asked for a test they’d say, no, you live in Cornwall.