Ending of free testing in England

PamelaJ1

Does anyone know how much a testing kit will cost?

Seems to vary. I "think" the UK was one of the few areas that offered free testing. Certainly family and friends abroad had to pay for LFTs. As I understand it countries in Europe charged but a much lower rate than suppliers want to charge now. Looking online it seems to range from about £3 to £5 for a single test! If you want, and can afford to buy 100 or more the cost comes down. This is a disgrace. I've just checked Boots and theirs is £3.95 for two tests which while cheaper is still out of the price range for many, and certainly if you're a family with 2 or 3 children. I think if the state don't want to provide them free of charge they could supply them at cost, which given their purchasing power would be pennies rather than pounds.

Thanks rosie

The trouble is BlueBelle that one never knows when it’s handy to have one.
A couple of weeks ago I was on holiday at a Warners hotel. Lots of older, maybe more vulnerable, people. I received an email informing me that someone I had been talking to, for a while, on the previous Saturday had tested positive. This was Wednesday and I was so relieved that I had my testing kit with me.

PamelaJ1

Does anyone know how much a testing kit will cost?

So far from Boots and Superdrug just under a couple of pounds
No doubt eventually will find them in the middle aisle of Aldi

I won’t be buying any I have a few left when they are gone they are gone

Does anyone know how much a testing kit will cost?

I have been trying for the past week to order LFT kits online but each time it has told me there are none, yet we have not yet reached the deadline. I still have some, fortunately.

I sing in three choirs and we are expected to take a test before we attend - and obviously not attend if it is positive. But I don't know how many people will pay for tests in future.

Oh goodness, what next.

It's infections that are being measured, not people who are ill.

It's because Scotland got the BA2 wave before England, possibly because we have had lower infection rates up until now. That's a guess. But England are coming up on the inside lane. New ONS data comes out tomorrow.

volver

Nope.

The higher rate is based on sampling and extrapolation done by the ONS, and is done exactly the same way in England.

Scotland does actually have a higher rate of infection than the rest of the UK at the moment. And anecdotally, about 90%+ are wearing masks.

Scotland's population is (more than anecdotally) less healthy in general than England's. That might explain some of it.

I had seen that, but thanks SueDonim for posting it.

I don't know about Fife but Dr Monica Doyle said recently that between 1/3 and 1/2 of the patients testing positive for Covid in Ninewells were either asymptomatic or had actually come in with something else.

volver

Mask wearing is required by law in Scotland and we have a far higher infection rate than England at the moment.

How do we explain that?

Have you seen this from the BBC, Volver?
Dr Christine Tait-Burkard, a leading infections expert at University of Edinburgh, told BBC Radio's Good Morning Scotland that cotton masks offered "much less protection" from the BA.2 subvariant because far fewer virus particles needed to be inhaled to catch it.
She said: "The surgical and cotton masks just allow for a little more of the virus to get through. They are still very good for people who are lower risk - they stop them shedding a lot of virus into the environment.
"For people who are more vulnerable it is probably the moment to increase to an FFP2 mask just until the pressure in the environment from so many people infected actually decreases."
Dr Tait-Burkard said she did not believe legal enforcement of face masks was needed any more, and that recommending people wear them in high risk environments was the right thing to do.

On your own local numbers, I wonder how many of those covid patients were admitted because of Covid and how many just happened to have Covid alongside whatever they were admitted for.

My husband is vulnerable, and yes I'm sick to death of it. We are a developed, organised country. We have national healthcare, we, as a rule are very disciplined - we queue remarkably well. As a national I do feel that we should be in a better position. People complied when they were asked to make sacrifices. Yet we have soaring rates etc. and the government response is confused and illogical.

I no longer go out at all.
I had severe covid before the first lockdown and i have not been able to recover properly.

I am very afraid of catching Covid again.
My immune system has been weakened by other health issues and I take ages to even get over a "mild cold"
That UK is no longer bothering with testing or any other safety restrictions has me wondering if the Tory Party simply would like treduce the numbers of us that are already chronically ill and on disability benefits.

On the subject of health care workers - DH had an appointment for a procedure in hospital just after I tested positive. He rang them to tell them this and they said if he didn’t have symptoms or test positive on the morning of the appointment he should still attend. He did, and of course told them again about my positive test. They were not concerned and the procedure went ahead. The following morning he tested positive. Perhaps there is now a policy to carry on with tests, procedures and appointments and if so you can see why because of the backlog, but surely this will just increase transmission and the strain on staffing. Someone must have taken a decision and given advice.

It’s a vicious circle isn’t it Daisymae and maybe one we can’t break we just have the virus variants weaken (as another poster said).
I feel most sorry for the very vulnerable some of whom will stay home more and that is very sad.

Tilly, I assume that health care workers are continually exposed to the virus so eventually they get infected. Plus they will get infected at home from people they live with as that's where many people pick it up.

Sorry OP,
I have digressed away from the question about Testing.

I shall carry on wearing masks in high volume/risk situations but I am confused by how many Health staff are off sick with Covid (if that is correct)
as in hospitals and surgeries they have been masked, gowned and gloved for nearly 2 years now and yet more people seem to have Covid.
If the same people don’t take similar precautions in their home life outside of the medical establishments they work in, do they not have confidence that it makes any difference?
If they do take precautions - why are so many getting it? ?

I'm on the fence about testing and about masks maddyone. Glad to say its not my responsibility to make the decision.

I don't think you are extreme in what you say about COVID. But I am fed up to the back teeth with the doomsayers. This is what we've got now. We need to get on with it.

There are 140-ish people with Covid in the hospitals in my area, apparently that one third of the available beds. So for a population of 300,000 people we have 450 beds in hospital? If that's the case we need to look at the fitness of purpose of the NHS, because COVID is here now and we need some long term planning.

I’ve had it once and I don’t want it again. I don’t agree with ending free testing whilst the virus is still so prevalent.
volver I believe you do know what you’re talking about and I like to see your very sensible posts about Covid. I realise I’m a bit emotional about Covid as I’m afraid of getting it again.

I have no time for Christina Pagel; her three myths in the article cited:

1. Covid is endemic: Nobody has said this and she is using it to create a false environment of discord, to suggest that we are being lied to.

2. People believe that COVID is evolving to become milder. That has never been proposed in any communication from anywhere, because it would be a lie. If you think that COVID is evolving to become milder, you’re not paying attention.

3. Nobody thinks we are “finished” our vaccination program. We’ve just started the second booster program for the elderly and vulnerable. Hardly “finished”.

Mathematician Pagel is part of Indy SAGE who are hardly exemplars of good pandemic forecasting. And are suddenly finding themselves irrelevant.

Sorry, but she gets on my wick. Please feel free to tell me I don't know what I'm talking about, I'm sure somebody will.

The stats are not completely useless because the ONS Survey is still being carried out and this gives a pretty good idea of how things are going.
In fact it is crucial that a track of the virus and sequencing is still done to give warning of a new and possibly more virulent strain emerging.
Our local hospitals have also declared Critical Incidents on several weekends lately, 39 Care homes were not admitting when I last looked and GPS surgeries affected likewise.
This is what “living with covid” is like.

www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/mar/30/uk-near-record-covid-cases-three-myths-omicron-pandemic

This one by Pagel.
Really good reading.
It’s just a political game isn’t it and all countries will follow suit for the popularity while it appears to be less severe.
The stats now from England are pretty much useless as who is actually properly testing, reporting,
Isolating etc. Without LFTs the stats are useless. But will be used by those in favour off the do nothing approach as evidence that the government has made the right decisions.
Incidentally our trust currently has a ‘critical incident’ declared due to Covid peak driving up demand. ED is closed to walk in patients, ambulances are not able to respond to calls and there is excess death and illness reported in their data. In our area Covid peak looks to be next 2-4 weeks so staff are bracing themselves. Not good is it.

www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/mar/31/charging-covid-tests-england-infections
Here is the Guardian article, seems well balanced

I have noticed although rates are high in Germany and France they have also dropped their mask ruling rules considerably.
I admit I really don’t have the faith that mask wearing makes that much difference to the spread of Omicron.