South London surge testing

[ThinkAboutItTomorrow]

I live in Wandsworth. Apparently everyone should book a surge test due to this South African variant. I went to book this morning but the soonest test slot is Monday.

This weekend pubs & restaurants will be full (& they've pedestrianised the streets to make plenty of capacity). it seems like very mixed messaging.

We're going away tomorrow for a long weekend in a holiday cottage. I'm booked in to a theme park on Friday and 2 pubs.

If this risk is high they'd put more restrictions back on, wouldn't they?

77 cases out of 650000 people makes the risk tiny. But I still feel conflicted.

[Katie517]

The last time they did surge testing in Bristol they found no new cases so I don’t think you need to worry to be honest. If it was that serious they would put local restrictions in place and not make people wait until Monday for a testing slot.

[ThinkAboutItTomorrow]

Good to know! I wfh and rarely go out so hardly a superspreader contender.

[SquirmOfEels]

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-56729607

"Those living in the affected areas should "still enjoy the easing of lockdown", according to the director of public health for Lambeth Council.
When asked on the Today programme whether people in the boroughs should stay at home rather than visit shops or pub gardens, Ruth Hutt replied: "No, we want everybody to follow the advice that still stands around 'hands, face, space'.

[vera99]

If you combine Johnson's statement today that it is lockdown that has done the heavy lifting with their obvious concern with new variants which attempting to test 600k people most certainly is then that dims somewhat the vaccine optimism we are all feeling at the moment. My takeaway if the government is signalling it ain't over by a long way and/or Johnson has learned the lesson of under-promising and over-delivering. At least he's stopped the bluster bullshitting and for that we must be grateful.

[Youngatheart00]

Some pharmacies are letting you pick up boxes of lateral flow tests free of charge. We got some from boots this week. Yes there is risk in going out to get them, but less risk than travelling across the country and to all those places without a negative test.

[SquirmOfEels]

@Youngatheart00

Some pharmacies are letting you pick up boxes of lateral flow tests free of charge. We got some from boots this week. Yes there is risk in going out to get them, but less risk than travelling across the country and to all those places without a negative test.

The Lambeth and Wandsworth surge testing is PCR (to play hunt the variant) not LFT

[ExpulsoCorona]

I've seen this and decided to book on the main booking site instead of the council one. This is fine to do and has a lot more availability, you tick the box that says no symptoms and then the box that says you have been advised to test by the council. Friends have also ordered home tests for this.

[ASchuylerSister]

Did anyone listen to Shelagh Fogarty on LBC today? There was a lady on from public health talking about the extra testing in Lambeth and I’m sure she said that most of the 70 cases were linked to a care home?

Also, some of the staff/residents had had jabs, still tested positive for SA variant but had no symptoms? Did I hear her right?

[ASchuylerSister]

I’ve just gone back and listened on catch up and the public health lady definitely says that a significant number of those cases are linked to a care home.

The outbreak was picked up by routine testing that care homes do - weekly for staff and monthly for residents - none has symptoms at the time of testing. This is great news for the vaccine programme isn’t it? So although you can still pass it on, no one was ill from the SA strain.

[ExpulsoCorona]

Yes but since then it has also spread within a primary school www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-56729607

[Youngatheart00]

If it’s spread in 2 primary schools why the hell are they only asking over 11s to test??!

[greenlynx]

Yes, it’s pretty serious. We’ve got at least 44 cases out of just 1 in the period of strict lockdown. So imagine how many we could get now when the restrictions are easing.
I think that lots of people got the wrong idea how the vaccination would work. They think that vaccinated people don’t get COVID and therefore don’t pass further. But they do get COVID, they just have mild or even no symptoms and unintentionally spread it.
Of course the government doesn’t want to put restrictions back but for political reasons not because it’s not serious.

[StarCat2020]

Sorry but this is why there is a push to vaccinate care home staff

Six of the 10 residents infected had received one dose of the AstraZeneca vaccine two or more weeks before their positive test date.

One of the 13 infected staff had a single Pfizer vaccine dose two or more weeks before their positive test.

[IceCreamAndCandyfloss]

@Youngatheart00

If it’s spread in 2 primary schools why the hell are they only asking over 11s to test??!

Yes, never understood this either.

Secondaries are testing here as standard and wear masks but neither is in place for primaries. A teacher poster posted a graph showing spread in primaries before this latest lockdown showing case numbers in general.

[Jo99996]

oh good more variants.

Can I copyright the phrase “There’s a mutant virus going round donechano”And ask for royalties each time it’s used?

[99victoria]

They recently did surge testing where I lived because they identified a couple of people with the SA variant.
Cue huge lines of people outside the testing centre hours before it opened - people 'terrified' etc. 4 days of testing ensued then nothing for 3 weeks from the Council who eventually informed us all they had not found any cases of the variant!

[Sparechange]

I also live in Wandsworth and tried to book a test. Nothing for 6 days, so they really can’t be that concerned about it.

Echo what others said about there being no cases found the other times they’ve done this, so it smacks of something they need to be seen to be doing, rather than something that’s actually needed

[ajandjjmum]

DD lives in Wandsworth. She is tested when she goes into the office - had a test this morning. She also has a pack of 7 tests at home, and intends to test a couple of times a week. She had a Covid test prior to coming home at Christmas - felt fine - but it came back positive. It makes sense for everyone to keep testing.

Always something to worry about!

[bookworm1632]

It's extremely serious because if this gets out of control, i.e. spreads nationally, you can kiss herd immunity goodbye at least for 2021.

The AZ vaccine has almost zero impact on the spread of the SA variant - that's certain to mean extended restrictions.

[SquirmOfEels]

She also has a pack of 7 tests at home

Those will be LFTs - the surge testing is PCR

Wandsworth had opened 3 new test centres for surge PCRs, so if there's a wait even with extra capacity, it means that lots of people must have come forward

[Blubellwood]

@Sparechange

I also live in Wandsworth and tried to book a test. Nothing for 6 days, so they really can’t be that concerned about it.

Echo what others said about there being no cases found the other times they’ve done this, so it smacks of something they need to be seen to be doing, rather than something that’s actually needed

That’s good but like comparing apples and oranges. Two cases in lockdown with no mixing is very different to dozens whilst opening up and more mixing.

[ExpulsoCorona]

@Sparechange

I also live in Wandsworth and tried to book a test. Nothing for 6 days, so they really can’t be that concerned about it.

Echo what others said about there being no cases found the other times they’ve done this, so it smacks of something they need to be seen to be doing, rather than something that’s actually needed

@Sparechange you can go on the normal gov.uk booking site and get appointments today or order home test kits. The three sites are just extra due to the surge testing. There's an option on the normal site to say my council have asked me to test.

[ThinkAboutItTomorrow]

I've ordered postal tests which I'll do after the weekend. It's extremely unlikely we have it atm as we've hardly gone out for weeks.

From what I've read the vaccine 'should' still work to stop serious illness from the SA variant so with most of the vulnerable vaccinated we should be ok. Surely There's no need to worry about a virus that most people don't know they have and only a tiny number would even be hospitalised by, however virulent it is?

[SquirmOfEels]

There's no need to worry about a virus that most people don't know they have and only a tiny number would even be hospitalised by, however virulent it is?

Finding out how many people have it, and whether they are becoming symptomatic, will be really important in working out whether we do need to worry

[Beebityboo]

I am so bloody worried about this . I desperately hope they don't extend May 17th restriction lifting because of it.