Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask Her Majesty's Government what plans they have to introduce systematic regular COVID-19 testing of all NHS and care staff and patients.

Current clinical advice is that asymptomatic testing can be conducted in any setting where clinically appropriate, for outbreak investigation and infection control. For example, we are testing all emergency admissions to hospital, and all care home residents before they are discharged into a social care setting.

For staff, for example, an asymptomatic staff member could be tested when a patient they had been treating unexpectedly tests positive for COVID-19, in order to reduce the risk of spreading infection in healthcare organisations.

It is not always appropriate to routinely test asymptomatic staff, and so we currently suggest a more strategic and specific approach. These decisions are made by local decision makers.