Isolating for 14 after app contact

[Starisnotanumber]

I have read that if you are in contact with someone with coronavirus and are contacted by the public health people you are going to have to self isolate for 14 days.
This has stopped me from even considering it. I have to travel on public transport to and from work it's highly likely that there is going to be someone nearby over the next few weeks that has the virus.
I can't see my employer paying full pay for 14 days, I am a key worker and can't work from home.
Has anyone any idea about pay for self isolating if you are not sick.

I think it will only be for high risk contacts - eg you are within 2m of someone for x minutes and they develop symptoms within a couple of days or something like that? Lower risk contacts you will be warned to be extra alert. So if maintaining good SD, it shouldn't happen that often unless community rates very high in which case we will probably be locked down more again?

Your employer doesn't get to choose. You can get SSP, that hasn't changed. Consider what you're saying - if public health consider it to be a high probability that you may soon become asymptomatically infectious with covid-19 (most people being at their most infectious just before they get symptoms), you don't want to isolate. So that's very bad news for all vulnerable people who unwittingly go near you.

We haven't had any delay at all yet, our regular postman and the main regular parcel couriers haven't been ill, so it might just be some areas that have been affected.

Sorry that last one was for another thread...

@Starisnotanumber I get where you’re coming from. My public employer would also frown on potentially numerous isolation periods. They certainly have done so far.

Didn't know you could qualify for sick pay if you are not off sick just isolating that's under 100.00 a week though and goes nowhere near paying the bills
If I go off for 14 days after being near someone on a bus or train this could happen multiple times. The bus company says it only picks up 25% of capacity but most of them stay downstairs so I usually go upstairs.
I understand that most people are not going to travel if they have actual symptoms but as shown on TV and in newspapers there are loads of idiots

There are asymptomatic cases who can also spread the virus. So if you knew you had been exposed and didn't isolate, why wouldn't that make you one of the "loads of idiots"?

What did you think was the point of contact tracing?

Yup, the only way that app is going near my phone is if it is mandatory.

You have to be really quite near though and not just in passing. I don't know how likely that is on public transport if they keep capacity capped. London has very low rates at the moment and public transport has been being used throughout by keyworkers.

In the NHS if we have contact with someone who turns out to be positive then we’re advised to carry on going to work unless we develop symptoms. This is regardless of whether or not you were wearing PPE and doesn’t match up with the contact tracing advice.

It appears that the r value has gone below one especially in London
It seems to be another example of the government doing something later than is necessary. Someone can come in by plane today from America no problems and just go wherever they want with no health checks in UK but in the next couple of weeks someone from new Zealand where there are no cases will have to do 14 days isolating(unless they are lorry drivers fruit pickers or professional sports players)

You won’t be asked to isolate just because someone on the bus has developed symptoms. The risk assessment will calculate risk based on proximity, length of time etc and advise those who have the highest risk of exposure to isolate.
Could likely be highly inconvenient yes, and some people may end up isolating repeatedly, but anything else kind of misses the point.

In the NHS if we have contact with someone who turns out to be positive then we’re advised to carry on going to work unless we develop symptoms. This is regardless of whether or not you were wearing PPE and doesn’t match up with the contact tracing advice.

Oh I despair! It's all just pick-and-mix isn't it? They've got no integrated strategy.

The parameters for having to isolate will have to be relatively loose otherwise it will be chaos, if its strict those on full sick pay will just never go to work and will be constantly self isolating, whole workforces/ offices will be off etc.
Those with no sick pay/ ssp will not dowload the app if they think they will lose vast amounts of money.
Companys with possible redundancys coming who will they choose? Rightly or wrongly anyone contastly off for 14 days isnt going to be flavour of the month.
Same applies with schools, one kid coughs in a bubble whats that actually going to mean for the others/ teachers etc.

The whole thing is going to be a nightmare.

Surely its going to be if someone tests positive the tracing comes in and then isolation not if soneone shows symptons.

Yes it needs to depend on test results but they need to sort out a proper joined up system asap. As well as the app they have hired an army of people to be contact tracers and the whole thing will be a complete waste of time and money unless the contacts actually quarantine.

Nobody really seems to know the full ins and outs of what's going to be asked of us. People who work in nhs and care homes are likely to be in contact with the virus but hopefully using ppe so shouldn't need to self isolate.
Theres no way the app can differentiate I hope that there is some flexibility but wouldn't bank on it.

We don't need flexibility we need clarity, a joined up strategy and support for those who need to isolate or quarantine.

It's not just about the app. That can't work in isolation. Even the app + the army of human contact tracers together will not achieve anything unless they are part of a joined up strategy.

The aim is to break as many chains of transmission as possible and there are four things you need and they have to all work together.

1. Testing. We need to test everyone with symptoms and we need a fast turnaround for results so we have the most up to date information on where the virus is.

2. Isolation for those with symptoms or who have tested positive so they don't pass the virus on. Our current guidelines - stay at home for 7 days with the rest of your household - are worse than inadequate.

3. Contact tracing so we know who else might be about to pass it on pre-symptomatically or asymptomatically. WHO define a contact as anyone with the following exposures to a COVID-19 case, from 2 days before to 14 days after the case’s onset of illness:

• Being within 1 metre of a COVID-19 case for >15 minutes;
• Direct physical contact with a COVID-19 case;

• Providing direct care for patients with COVID-19 disease without using proper personal protective equipment (PPE);
• Other definitions, as indicated by local risk assessments (they provide a table of things to consider)

www.who.int/publications-detail/contact-tracing-in-the-context-of-covid-19

Most contact tracing needs to be done by people, even in places like South Korea and Singapore that have pioneered the use of apps.

4. Quarantine of contacts for 14 days so they actually don't pass it on.

This is how to break the chains of transmission, get the R number right down and come out of lockdown as safely as possible.

Our government have been very, very slowly dragged round to the idea that widespread testing and contact tracing are worth doing but these two things only provide information. We need to act on that information and do the other two things - isolation and quarantine - or it's pointless. We're not doing either effectively at the moment.

We need to do everything we can to ensure people can isolate and quarantine as effectively as possible while preserving their livelihoods and human rights.

We need to do everything we can to ensure people can isolate and quarantine as effectively as possible while preserving their livelihoods and human rights.

Here's what I reckon:

Anyone who is told to isolate or quarantine should not have to rely on SSP or benefits, they should get 80% furlough pay for those weeks.

Employers should be made to respect isolation and quarantine as valid reasons for time off, working from home or furlough. Employers who press their workforce to continue coming in when they have symptoms, have tested positive or have been identified as a contact should be heavily fined by HSE.

It should be an automatically unfair reason to dismiss someone because they have taken a test or have isolated or quarantined on the advice of the NHS or a public health body. Negligently permitting the transmission of a pandemic virus in the workplace is a health and safety issue and if you are dismissed because you take action on a H&S issue it's automatically unfair. Which means you can take action against your employer from the first day, you don't have to wait until you've been there 2 years.

It should be made the default option for people to quarantine and/or isolate away from the rest of their household with appropriate medical monitoring and health care where necessary, and for an adequate amount of time.

We have loads of empty hotels, holiday parks, self catering holiday lets etc. and they're all on the brink of going bust. Why aren't we using that capacity for contacts who need to quarantine? The government could pay the hospitality industry to do something really useful.

We have vast empty nightingale hospitals which have turned out to be obsolete by the time they were built. Why aren't we refitting them as comfortable places to monitor and care for anyone with symptoms or who has tested positive and who can isolate away from the rest of their household?

Not everyone would be able to isolate or quarantine away from their families and that absolutely needs to be respected but there are a lot of people who could, and who would welcome the chance to not pass it on if the proper support was in place and if their human rights were respected.

All of this would cost a lot of money but it would be much cheaper than a second wave and a second lockdown.

Does anyone else think that a lot of teens will self report symptoms because they'll think it's a hilarious prank on any people they've had contact with?

I am very disappointed the app is working on 'symptoms' not positive tests.

Could you not get tested? I got tested, was negative, went back to work. You get results in 2 days.

They need to stop losing people’s tests.

So it works on symptoms? Someone could use the app to report a cough that they are pretty sure is hayfever, but they input it just in case. This causes 3 others and their whole families to need to isolate for 14 days?

Christ no one will ever be at work or school.

So it works on symptoms? Someone could use the app to report a cough that they are pretty sure is hayfever, but they input it just in case. This causes 3 others and their whole families to need to isolate for 14 days?

Yes, exactly. Symptoms not tests. And like I say - how many teens with phones will self report symptoms 'for a laugh'. Or dare each other to stand really near people and then self report symptoms. It's got disaster written all over it.

Plus - and I can well understand this because everyone is very anxious - a lot of people I know have 'self diagnosed' with 'mild coronavirus' since this all started (the ones now getting negative antibody tests and saying the tests don't work!) People attribute every throat tickle to it now and will then report those symptoms on the app.

We have already decided that we will be avoiding being nearby to anyone we don't absolutely have to be for the foreseeable future as staying in repeatedly with ds for 14 days will a nightmare. (I'm not exaggerating). So if other people have the same thoughts, the app will be effective in social distancing.

John Newton - the government’s testing tsar - who is leading the nation’s testing programme, has said that anyone who is deemed to have had "high-risk" contact with someone with coronavirus will be forced to self-isolate for 14 days.

It is believable that this forced self-isolation will come with the threat of a £1000 fine for those who disobey - the same as for those returning from other countries.

If this is all based solely on data from an app relying on bluetooth proximity and time, and crucially on self-reported symptoms, then I would not be surprised if take-up of the app is very, very low. I would never download it if this is how it will be operated.

I would obey a personal an isolation order if I could be told that I had contact with a test-confirmed person, when, where and for how long, and with evidence that neither party was using PPE at the time. After 5-7 days from the contact I would expect to be offered a test myself.