'GAME-CHANGER'
Finger-prick coronavirus tests ‘available in days from Boots and Amazon’, Gov reveals
A CORONAVIRUS home test kit will be available "within days" - from Amazon and Boots, the Government has revealed.
The finger-prick test, which detects antibodies to the virus in the blood, is able to determine if someone has or has already had Covid-19.
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When a person gets infected by the virus, the body starts making specially designed proteins called antibodies to fight the infection.
MPs heard the Government has bought 3.5 million antibody tests and will priorities NHS staff and key workers - like doctors and nurses - to enable people to go back to work.
It comes as...
- Prince Charles tested positive for coronavirus and is currently self-isolating in Scotland
- A 21-year-old woman was named as the UK's youngest coronavirus victim with no existing health concerns
- Top British diplomat, 37, dies of coronavirus in Hungary
- More than 405,000 people have signed up as NHS volunteers to help vulnerable people
- Brits started to shame their neighbours for ignoring strict government lockdown laws
- Cops were filmed shouting at Brit sunbathers telling them "it's not a holiday, it's a lockdown"
- Researchers have warned coronavirus could have already infected half the UK population
Professor Sharon Peacock, director of the National Infection Service at Public Health England (PHE), told the Science and Technology Committee that the tests will be available "within days".
But, the Government tonight made it clear those tests will not be available for the public to buy.
Instead, Boots and Amazon will be used to distribute tests to NHS workers and other critical workers who are self-isolating - along Government lines.
Samples of the test are being quality checked in Oxford this week before they are made available for distribution nationwide.
Prof Sharon Peacock, from the National Infection Service, said they will be sold for a small fee or given away for free.
She told the Committee: “Once we are assured that they do work, they will be rolled out into the community.
“Testing the test is a small matter, and I anticipate that it will be done by the end of this week.
“Once the bulk of the tests arrive they will be distributed into the community, where there will be a mechanism to order a test via Amazon.
“In the near future people will be able to order a test that they can test themselves or go to Boots, or somewhere similar to have their finger prick test done.”
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Asked whether this meant it would be available in days, rather than weeks or months, she replied: “Absolutely.”
Prof Peacock added: “If you have antibodies you know you have had the infection. This is not just for health workers, this is for the general population.
“Over time we would expect a proportion of the population to test positive and that will allow them to get back to work.”
Users or pharmacists will have to prick a finger and place a drop of blood on a stick, which looks like a home pregnancy test.
Some will give an immediate result and others must be returned to a lab. Results will be recorded on medical records.
Currently, Public Health England is only testing patients for Covid-19 in hospital with nasal swabs.
This test only shows whether someone has the virus - and not whether they have already recovered from it.
However, the new at-home test would reveal if someone has had the bug and built up immunity, and is therefore unlikely to catch it again.
The chief medical officer, Chris Whitty, explained the government would prioritise key workers - such as NHS staff - for the new antibody test.
Explaining the process at the Downing Street press briefing tonight, he said: "Once we’re confident of which tests will work and how many we have available to use, there’s a hierarchy of things that we need to do.
"We need to start off by answering that critical question - what proportion of people get this without any symptoms because that has big implications for the way we then manage this.
"Then we need to help make sure we can get NHS workers tested to make sure we can work out who is immune, or almost certainly immune, to this infection and who isn’t.
"We’ll basically go out in kind of a graded way from there."
He added: "I do not think - and I want to be clear - that this is something that we’ll be suddenly ordering on the internet next week.
"We need to go through the evaluation, then the first critical uses, and then spread it out from there."
The NHS is also carrying out separate tests to see if people currently have the virus, which are being given to patients in hospitals alongside some community sampling.
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A Boots UK spokesperson told The Sun Online: “We are keen to work with the Government to explore opportunities to support Covid-19 testing and to support the NHS in any way we can.
"However we do not have any type of Covid-19 tests in our stores.
"Customers should not make a trip to a Boots store or pharmacy for this purpose.”
Ramping up tests
Also during tonight's briefing, Boris Johnson said the Government was "massively ramping up" testing for coronavirus as he announced that 405,000 people have now signed up as volunteers to help vulnerable people.
He said it was hoped that "very soon" 250,000 tests would be carried out each day.
Speaking at the daily press conference inside Number 10, he added that he wanted to offer a "special thank you to everyone who has now volunteered to help the NHS.
"When we launched the appeal last night, we hoped to get 250,000 volunteers over a few days.
"But I can tell you that in just 24 hours, 405,000 people have responded to the call.
"That is already, in one day, as many volunteers as the population of Coventry."
Prof Whitty also said there were shortages along many supply chains in the production of tests because "every country in the world is simultaneously wanting this new thing".
He added: "It's not that there is no testing going on, what we need, clearly, is to be able to scale it up."
Answering a question about how well the country was coping, Mr Johnson said that "never in our history has the Government put its arms around people in the way we are doing now to help them get through this time".
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He added that a tailored package of support would be announced on Thursday to help self-employed people.
The PM said: "I do think when you look at the sheer scale of what the Government is doing to get this country through, we will cope and are coping very well indeed under the most challenging possible circumstances.
"To come out of it well together as I know we can, we all need to follow the instructions the Government have given and to stay at home, protect the NHS and that's the way to save lives."
Chief Medical Officer Chris Whitty explains how coronavirus testing will be rolled out and why there are delays
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