Technical glitch in UK’s coronavirus testing system fixed, minister says
A technical problem in England’s coronavirus testing data system has now been fixed and should not happen again, Work and Pensions Secretary Therese Coffey said this morning.
The UK reported a record daily jump of 22,961 Covid-19 cases yesterday after authorities said a technical issue had meant that over 15,000 test results had not been transferred into computer systems used by contact tracers.
Some 12,594 new infections were reported today following the spike in cases on Sunday after the error was discovered.
“The glitch has been found and fixed and I’m sure that the changes are brought in straight away to make sure this sort of problem doesn’t happen again,” Coffey told Times Radio.
The technical problem, which was identified on Friday, led to 15,841 cases not being uploaded into reporting dashboards used by the NHS contact-tracing system.
A Department of Health spokesperson said the issue had not affected people receiving test results, and all those who tested positive for coronavirus had been informed.
Health secretary Matt Hancock is due to update Parliament on the error later today.
News of the problem has prompted further criticism of the government’s “world-beating” test and trace system, with shadow health secretary Jonathan Ashworth branding the error “shambolic”.
“We fully understand the concern this may cause and further robust measures have been put in place as a result,” said Michael Brodie, Public Health England’s interim chief executive.
PHE said that all the people concerned had been given their results in a timely fashion, and that those with positive results had been told to self-isolate.