Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether NHS staff working directly in the care and treatment of people who are immuno-compromised are being prioritised for covid-19 testing even when asymptomatic; and if he will make a statement.
Asymptomatic testing is currently mainly conducted for outbreak investigation and infection control - where prevalence is thought to be higher and/or where individuals are more at risk from COVID-19. This includes patients, National Health Service staff, care home staff and residents.
As capacity increases and new innovations come onstream, and as we gain new clinical and scientific evidence, we will continually review our approach to asymptomatic testing to ensure we are deploying it in the most effective way and expand our testing offer.