Coronavirus: Scientists want to test all Norwich residents for disease every week
Professor suggests army reservists could pick up completed swabs on same day as bin collections
Scientists in Norwich are hoping they can help end the lockdown by introducing weekly coronavirus testing for all 140,000 of the city’s residents.
Professor Neil Hall, director of the Earlham Institute, a research facility in the city, said he would like the government to adopt the approach nationwide.
He said infrastructure for a pilot scheme, of a few wards of about 10,000 people each, could be put in place within “a couple of weeks”.
The government has faced pressure to test more of the population, as well as health and care staff, so that workers can return to their jobs. Business leaders and Conservative MPs have warned that without an easing of the lockdown, based on testing and contact tracing, the economy faces ruin.
“The way we’d envisage doing it is we’d post out test kits to people, they would be barcoded, they’d self-swab and then someone would come round once a week to pick up the tests,” said Prof Hall.
“They would have to be informed to take that test on a specific day, maybe through a text message.”
He said people who tested positive for Covid-19 would be contacted and advised on how to self-isolate, and contact tracing would be carried out.
In early April, health secretary Matt Hancock set a target of carrying out 100,000 daily tests by the end of the month, and came under mounting pressure to hit that figure.
On 1 May, it was announced that number had been exceeded, reaching 122,000. But more than 40,000 of these were home-testing kits sent out to private addresses or satellite NHS sites on the day, with no proof of whether they had yet been used.
And since then the daily test figure has declined, with only 87,000 carried out in the 24 hours to Tuesday.
Then a week ago Boris Johnson set a new target of 200,000 daily tests as he came under attack from Keir Starmer. He said it was the government’s ambition to hit 200,000 tests by the end of May and go beyond that at a later date.
Also in April, Mr Hancock had announced a mass expansion of testing in care homes, but on Wednesday ministers admitted that tests would not be rolled out to all facilities for another three weeks.
Some 40 per cent of deaths have been in care homes, official statistics show.
The independent Sage group of scientists has branded Mr Johnson’s easing of the lockdown “dangerous”, warning further epidemics are inevitable.
Crowded London Tube trains on Wednesday, when people were urged to return to work, have raised alarm that people not showing symptoms could be spreading the virus, leading to a fresh wave of infections.
Prof Hall has discussed whether army reserves could collect tests from households, and whether they could coincide with weekly bin collections.
“The bin men idea is an idea that has been floated and on the face of it seems a bit ludicrous, but I suppose in some ways it makes a little bit of sense,” he said.
“The bin lorries go around the city in a seven-day cycle, everyone knows on what day they have to put their bin out and therefore it’s easier to remember that you might need to have your test kit picked up that day.
“In my mind it wouldn’t necessarily be the bin men knocking on the door and saying ‘have you got your test’ but it might well be that someone would come around shortly before the bin lorries or whatever to pick up the test kits from those particular streets which had their collection that day.”
Norwich has the lowest coronavirus death rates of any local authority area in England and Wales, which is put down to the city closing down before most of the rest of the UK. Other factors include its geographical isolation, relatively low levels of other health issues and high compliance with the lockdown.
Prof Hall said: “What I would ideally like is for this to fit into a government testing strategy.
“At the moment, the testing is really being targeted at people who are reporting at hospitals with disease or in homes of people who have tested positive. We’re always chasing the disease, we’re always a step behind the virus. This is just one way I think that we could get ahead of it.”
“At the moment, as I understand it, the community testing approach isn’t at the forefront of their strategy and I think they’re still making sure there’s capacity to deliver to high-risk environments – care workers and hospitals is their priority.
“We’re hoping this would be something that becomes part of the strategy as I think it’s one way that we could help get out of lockdown.”
A Department of Health spokesperson said: “We have significantly and rapidly increased our testing capability and are working to ensure everyone who needs a test can get one.
“We continually consider options to extend testing but have no immediate plans for city-wide testing.”
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