I welcome the news that the UK is now testing high volumes of people – on 30th April over 122,000 tests were carried out across the UK.

Testing is now available for:

• all essential workers including NHS and social care workers with symptoms
• anyone over 65 with symptoms
• anyone whose work cannot be done from home (for example, construction workers, shop workers, emergency plumbers and delivery drivers) with symptoms.

The government will also test anyone who has symptoms of coronavirus that lives with those identified above.

This expanded criterion is in addition to:

• Social care workers and residents in care homes (with or without symptoms) both to investigate outbreaks and, following successful pilots, as part of a rolling programme to test all care homes across England with Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland operating their own lists and criteria.
• NHS workers and patients without symptoms, in line with NHS England guidance.

People can register at the testing portal using this link (https://bit.ly/BookTesting). Full guidance on testing can be viewed here (https://bit.ly/TestingGuidance).