Ministers have refused to bring back free tests after axing them under Boris Johnson’s ‘Living With Covid’ strategy, insisting that the ‘£2billion-a-month’ swabbing regime was ‘simply unsustainable’.
People now have to purchase the swabs from most High Street chemists, where they are available for about £2 each – and a pack of five setting Britons back just under £10.
But this, plus a gradual end to WFH, appears to have caused another surge in Covid cases and staff sickness.
Though UK Health Security Agency figures show that cases have recently plateaued and are now falling, the ONS estimates 3.7million people were carrying the virus on any given day in the week ending April 9 – a near 9% fall on the record 4.1million the previous week.
A member of the NHS Test and Trace collects a sample from a member of the public at the drive-thru Covid-19 testing site on Hawkwood Road in Bournemouth, February 5, 2022
