People in England will no longer have to take a test for coronaviruses after a positive test, as the UK government is about to announce.
The care minister said that she understood the plan was being considered but that there wasn't a decision yet. She didn't know when the announcement would be made.
She said there were no immediate plans to reduce the seven-day minimum isolation period down to five if a negative flow is obtained, but that it was a reasonable question to ask and that scientists were currently considering.
It is thought that about 1 million people are isolated due to Covid, causing widespread absences and disruption across essential services.
The government doesn't collect figures on self-isolation, but estimates it based on the number of people who have tested positive in the last few days.
Hospitals are reporting that they are struggling to cope with staff absences, with several declaring critical incidents and 17 in Greater Manchester saying they would suspend some non-urgent surgery as 15% of staff were off sick. A memo from the North East ambulance service foundation trust suggested that people suffering from a heart attack or stroke should be taken to the hospital by friends or family.
Matthew Taylor, the chief executive of the National Health Service Confederation, told the Today programme that healthcare absences were about 10%, with Covid the biggest reason, but that this figure was much higher in some hospital trusts.
He was in favor of removing the confirmatory PCR as long as it is based on the science and not on politics and blind hope, and he welcomed any measures that could ease pressure on hospitals, which are asking staff on leave or rest days, or who are recently retired.
He said that bringing the isolation period down to five days would only be an option if the science shows it is safe.
The situation in relation to staff absences is so bad that we need to consider all possibilities.
The government knew that this would be one of the most pressurised winters due to the build up of the swine flu and the arrival of the Omicron variant. She said that they had put an extra £5.4 billion of investment into trying to get more staff, more beds and more capacity with the Nightingales.
According to the reports, friends or family are being asked to transport potential heart attack or stroke sufferers to hospital, which she said was not an acceptable approach.
She told Sky News that they did not put that in place. We have more ambulance crews in operation than we have ever had, and we gave £55m extra to cover staff and make sure we had increases in staff and staffing levels.
