COVID-19: Testing for Care Home Staff

Part of 6. Topical Questions – in the Senedd at 2:57 pm on 15 July 2020.

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Photo of Vaughan Gething Vaughan Gething Labour 2:57, 15 July 2020

That is exactly the form of action that we're looking to undertake. A few weeks ago, we recognised that we needed to make further progress, and we weren't seeing the progress we wanted to, so we had to examine a range of different parts of the system. And this is set out in not just the written statement but in the strategy that's been published today. So, we look week to week—and it's a fairly small period of time—at what the figures are. We've looked at what we do in terms of the ease of people getting a test—that's now in a place where people can get a test quickly and easily. We then need to look at what happens from the point of testing to getting that test to the lab. We've already taken an example of NHS Wales labs, where we have increased the speed of that—we've changed the courier arrangements, as the First Minister indicated in answer to your question earlier.

And then when it comes to efficiency within the labs, it's an explanation not an excuse that the lab in particular in Manchester that serves large parts of north Wales had a technical issue that meant there was a slowdown. There are two points there. One is that, even though we're not in control of those labs, what we do need to understand is, if they do have that issue, that it's escalated to us much earlier on, so we don't find out at the end of a week that there's been a problem. We are now, though, in a position where we're getting that information from those lighthouse labs flowing directly into our system. So, as soon as the results are available, they're going to our local contact-tracing teams. So, actually contact tracing is still a very successful endeavour here in Wales, with over 90 per cent of contacts over the last three, four weeks being contacted and chased up successfully.

The final point is the programme of improvement we've got within the NHS Wales lab—it will have a more direct relationship with Public Health Wales, of course. And we're looking at improving the turnaround within those labs and what that will mean in terms of cost, in terms of the staffing model, and how we take that forward. Whilst we have very low prevalence rates, we need to get this right before we move into an autumn and a winter season, where we know that there'll be more tests undertaken because of the respiratory tract infections that are a common part of the autumn and winter seasons. So, good news that we have low prevalence. We are aware that there are issues that we need to resolve—we're honestly dealing with those, and we'll be open with the public and Members about that improvement action, and we'll continue to publish the figures to show how successful we are in improving those turnaround times.