Coronavirus: Government must set out better testing strategy to help UK exit lockdown, says laboratories chief

The government’s arbitrary target of increasing coronavirus testing to 200,000 a day is fuelling a “wild west” of diagnostics without a focus on the longer-term strategy needed to help the UK exit lockdown, the head of Britain’s biomedical science body has warned.

Allan Wilson, president of the Institute of Biomedical Science (IBMS), told The Independent the “political dogma” driving decisions on the next phase of testing for Covid-19 was causing frustration among NHS laboratories.

He said the industry wanted to see a more considered approach than the “first come, first served” system in place at the moment with NHS laboratories competing with the government’s hastily set up Lighthouse Labs – three mega-labs in Milton Keynes, Cheshire and Glasgow with the capacity to do tens of thousands of tests a day.

Mr Wilson, a biomedical scientist for cellular pathology at NHS Lanarkshire, said the health service had more than enough capacity now to do more than 100,000 coronavirus tests a day but that shortages in the supply of key chemicals meant this was being limited to about 30,000 tests a day.

Reaching a sufficient amount of daily testing to confirm whether people are infected with coronavirus or not will be crucial to the UK relaxing lockdown rules and avoiding a second wave of infection that could overwhelm the NHS.

Mr Wilson said now was the time to develop a longer-term strategic view on what would be needed.

“We seem to be reacting to announcements rather than being strategic. We need that strategic approach. It would not be that hard to do, it’s a case of modelling what we need and planning how to get there.”

He said the targets had created a “wild west of testing” that had taken the focus away from clinical need to meeting a target, which “is not helpful”.

“Patients with symptoms are tested as priority but then after that it’s on a first come, first served basis,” he said, adding he was sure the government would hit its target because of the way it had been manipulated by including home-testing kits and different types of tests.

“The way [the government] count tests is not valid at all. The 200,000 target was changed shortly after the prime minister said it, from tests carried out to capacity. To say we have capacity for 200,000 tests is much more difficult to evidence.”

Earlier this week, large parts of south London, including four of the capital’s hospitals, had to introduce restrictions on testing because of a shortage of chemicals, or reagents, used in the testing.

Mr Wilson said that while supplies had improved since March the UK was competing for chemicals on a global basis: “We don’t have much of a diagnostics industry in the UK. Germany and South Korea are in a much better position and produce their reagents in country. We don’t manufacture any really and that’s a real weakness we have. We have to join the queue.

“It was always hand to mouth. There has never been a secure supply chain for the reagents. That’s the real frustration. We could be doing a 100,000 tests a day if we had the reagents, we have the local infrastructure.

“Because of the lower supply we are doing 25 to 30,000 samples a day but that’s only because of the supply chain. We could be doing three times as much if not more. The real constraint is the supply chain and we also end up competing with the Lighthouse laboratories.”

Asked by The Independent about Mr Wilson’s comments at the daily Downing Street press conference, environment minister George Eustice said he thought it was “important and helpful” to have targets to expand capacity.

He said: “I don’t really understand at all why that would distract from those that are delivering the current test capacity, they can continue to do so. The planning is done by an entirely different set of people.”

He said testing would become an important feature of the test, track and isolate approach with people who reported they had symptoms through the new NHS app.

The IBMS, which is the leading professional body for biomedical scientists with 20,000 members, has warned ministers that the parallel system of pop-up mass-testing centres is counterproductive and has introduced more competition for supplies.

It wants the government to set out clear aims, based on modelling, for what the test, trace and isolate model will look like to allow the NHS labs to plan for the capacity they will need.

An NHS England spokesperson said there should be enough chemicals available for tests to continue if labs cooperated with each other.

They said: “There is currently a global demand for reagent, but as the NHS uses a number of suppliers and labs, hospitals will have access to supply, either within their own Public Health England or NHS lab, or working across their region with other organisations to ensure continuity of supply where that’s needed.”