Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps his Department is taking to increase the covid-19 testing capacity in (a) Stoke-on-Trent and (b) Staffordshire.

We have increased our testing capacity from 2000 tests a day in March to over 700,000 tests per day. People in Stoke-on-Trent and Staffordshire with Covid symptoms are able to access tests either at Regional and Local testing sites or by ordering a home test.

The Community Testing Programme (CTP) was launched in December 2020 with the aim of using rapid asymptomatic testing to find and isolate positive cases within the community in order to help reduce the spread of the virus

Stoke on Trent, East Staffordshire, South Staffordshire and Staffordshire Moorlands are currently rolling out community testing.