Coronavirus: Hospitals urged to use any available lab space to test NHS staff for infection

Figures show one in four doctors are off work in self isolation because they have symptoms

Hospitals should use spare laboratory space to test self-isolating NHS staff for coronavirus, Matt Hancock has said.

The health secretary says he wants as many front-line workers as possible to be tested for Covid-19 so they could return to work if found clear of the illness.

And he has scrapped previous government guidelines that 85 per cent of tests must be reserved for patients, even if there were spare to go round.

The intervention comes amid mounting criticism of both the government and Mr Hancock himself for a lack of overall testing in the UK – a failure which critics say leaves the country far behind others in their battle to suppress the infection.

Figures released on Tuesday suggest one in four doctors and one in five nurses are currently off work having to self-isolate – either because they are showing symptoms or a member of their household is.

Without tests being provided, the British Medical Association has said, they cannot get back on duty.

Speaking at Tuesday afternoon’s daily government press conference, cabinet office minister Michael Gove admitted the UK had to go “further, faster” to build up its capacity.

Ministers have now announced plans to work with the private sector and universities to scale up testing, but Mr Gove admitted the government had more to do.

“More NHS staff are returning to the front line, and more testing is taking place to help those self-isolating come back, and to protect those working so hard in our hospitals and in social care,” he said. “But while the rate of testing is increasing, we must go further, faster.”

He said it had been difficult to source the reagents required for tests at a time when much of the world was trying to buy the same chemicals – but could not explain why the government had been so slow in attempting to establish an overarching testing system.

Dr Chaand Nagpaul, chairman of the BMA, said: “It’s been well over two weeks since the government said it was going to roll out priority testing for healthcare staff.

“But many doctors still have no idea about where or how they can get tested.”

Jeremy Hunt, the Conservative former health secretary, said it was “very worrying” that the government had not already introduced mass testing.

“It is internationally proven as the most effective way of breaking the chain of transmission,” Mr Hunt said.

“However difficult it is to source the reagents to ramp up the capacity of laboratories up and down the country, it is essential that mass community testing is part of our national strategy.”

More than 1,700 have died in the UK from coronavirus, with a further 25,150 people infected.