UK PM to launch coronavirus ‘Test & Trace Programme’ today to help end restrictions on movement

Britain will never go it alone, says PM.

The UK Government said that it expects its coronavirus ‘Test and Trace Programme’ to be ready for launch today (Thursday) to help end restrictions on movement.

THE programme will require people that have been found to be in contact with someone infected by Covid-19, to isolate for 14 days even if they don’t present any symptoms. To prepare for the launch, the government says it has hired 25,000 contact tracers ready to report for duty from today. Their job will be to get in touch with people who have tested positive for the disease.

In short, anyone who tests positive for Covid-19 will be asked for the details of people they have been in close contact with, as well as places they visited over the previous seven days. Those details will be passed on to a contact tracer who will find which contacts will need to be instructed to isolate for up to 14 days.

“We will be asking people to stay at home,” stated Johnson. “If they don’t follow that advice, sanctions may be necessary,” he warned. Johnson is also considering sanctions for people who test positive for coronavirus but refuse to disclose their contacts. “We are relying on people’s public-spiritedness, on their willingness to co-operate and defeat the disease,” he added.

According to Baroness Dido Harding, who is leading the scheme, this process will play “a crucial role in ending restrictions on movement” where the country will “basically exchange national lockdown for individual isolation.”

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Pepi Sappal

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