Coronavirus daily test numbers fall from 120,000 to 76,000 to miss new daily target

The Cabinet Office minister revealed that Britain hit its target of 100,000 coronavirus tests a day for two days running, but was unable to meet it yesterday.

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Ministers scrambled to get up to 100,000 ahead of Friday's deadline and have promised to test the same number every day.

Mr Gove said today that 76,496 were done, a drop of around 25,000.

TESTS DROP

He told the No10 briefing tonight: "You might expect over a weekend, with fewer people going to work, a dip in the amount of coronavirus testing taking place.

"I don't think it detracts from the amazing achievement of the NHS in increasing the amount of tests that are available."

NHS Director Stephen Powis said there had been a "little bit of a dip at the weekend" but stressed "we anticipate that testing capacity will continue to increase".

He added that even when more tests had been carried out, the number of positive cases did not increase dramatically - suggesting the rate of infection within the community is declining.

Overall, a total of 1,206,405 coronavirus tests have been carried out in the UK since the beginning of April.

The number of confirmed cases for the deadly bug hit 186,599 today - up 4,339 since yesterday.

I don't think it detracts from the amazing achievement of the NHS in increasing the amount of tests that are available.

Michael Gove

Michael Gove stressed tonight that steps taken to extend testing would help get more people back to work.

He said: "Thanks to the hard work of so many across the NHS, Public Health England, our pharmaceutical sector and our universities, we have tested over 200,000 key workers and their families, allowing those who don't have the virus to go back to work and protecting those who do.

"We have now of course extended the criteria for testing beyond key workers to anyone over 65 displaying symptoms, and anyone who has to travel to get to work.

"And this week, we will be piloting new test, track and trace procedures on the Isle of Wight with a view to having them in place more widely later this month.

"All of these steps will help us to get more people back to work and help to support the delivery of our public services."

'TARGET HIT'

On Friday, Matt Hancock announced he had smashed his target of 100,000 a day,  which he set the country at the start of the month.

He has expanded the criteria meaning that 25million NHS staff, key workers and others who need to leave the house to go to their job can now get a test.

However, critics pointed out that the testing figure was not the total tests that had been done, but included thousands of home test kits had been sent out in the post.

Some of them may not yet have taken place, or the results have not yet been sent back.

Home testing kits have been flying this week, with ministers releasing nearly 15,000 a day direct to doorsteps.

It is seen as being the first stage of a plan to end the lockdown.

More testing will be set up, followed by an extensive track and trace programme to target anyone who may have been in contact with the killer bug.

PHASED APPROACH

Mr Gove also stressed that a localised approach could be used in future to help in a new strategy to contain new outbreaks.

It may mean that areas with fewer cases get to lift lockdown measures sooner, and if there's a new outbreak, then local lockdowns may be required again.

He said: "A phased approach will allow us to phase in measures and pause or reintroduce those restrictions that might be required in local areas to cope with the disease".

Boris Johnson tweeted this morning an appeal for Brits to stay on track and work together to beat the bug.

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He said: "I can confirm that we are past the peak of this disease.

"We are past the peak and we are on the downward slope.

"And we have so many reasons to be hopeful for the long term.

"But we can only defeat coronavirus by our collective discipline and working together."

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