Are we still supposed to report positive test results?

[altmember]

Started feeling a bit off towards the end of last week - had a slight sore throat, and bit of a tickly cough associated with that. Then started feeling worse over Sun/mon so did an LFT Tues morning. Got a very strong immediate positive line, so seems to be pretty certainly covid. Turns out all the relatives that I'd met up with over Christmas (well 7/8 of them) were all ill last week as well, mostly covid/flu like symptoms.

I'm not sure how many of the others bothered to test, but of the ones that did, I'm the only one that got a positive result. I guess it could be total coincidence and they've all had some other cold/flu virus instead.

Anyway, I went on the govt self reporting website for covid test results (same one that we were all using back along), and logged my result in there. I know of quite a few people who haven't bothered reporting their positive cases over the last 6 months, which sounds pretty common at this stage. But the govt have still been releasing official case numbers (up until this week it appears), so what use are these official case numbers if the vast majority of people aren't reporting? Obviously the official case stats are now completely meaningless, yet govt/media seem to have been using them as evidence that covid has been in decline for the last 6 months.

The website wasn't particularly clear about who should be reporting (it asks why you took this test, and just having symptoms isn't one of the selections). But I've not seen any official govt guidelines saying the govt don't want to know any more.

So are people supposed to be reporting positive test results now or does govt not give a fuck?

And further to reporting my result, I've now started receiving text messages from NHSResult telling me I need to enter my result into the NHS covid 19 app and it implies that I'll need to nominate any close contacts for tracing. Yet all the govt guidance online says that all this was ceased/abandoned back in Jan/Feb last year. So why are they still sending out the text messages?

Almost hilarious that now covid is once again running rampant across the country and now the govt aren't interested in monitoring/collecting stats about what's happening. It feels a bit like we're right back where we started 3 years ago and the govt still hasn't learned anything about dealing with a pandemic.

I'm not meaning to sound melodramatic, I know we need to find a way to live with it without resorting to draconian measures again. But I do think it's important for the powers to be to have good accurate data on what it actually going on out there.

I reported mine and it’s now on my on line medical records, so if I need the date I can see it.

You cant record the ones you buy in the shop so I assume you have leftover tests from when they were given out for free.

Yes, I have a few left from about a year ago when my dc's schools were making them all test daily.

I think they extrapolate the figures from the office of national statistics covid survey. I've been in it for ages and do a covid pcr test monthly and answer questions. From that they can see what percentage of the population has covid at any one time.

I am on the trial too, I always understood this is where the figured come from now.

Yes, the ONS stats are now more reliable than the govt's 'official' case figures. ONS is statistical predication of the current number of infections, whereas the govt's positive test count is supposed to be a reliable count of the actual number of people testing positive. They are subtly different - one is as estimate based on a random sample, the other is an actual count of test results (obviously they won't match because there are going to be a percentage of people who don't test - either because they think they've just got a regular cold, or are completely asymptomatic, not to mention variations in testing accuracy between LFT and PCR type tests).

But both are useful data to have. The ONS figures are extrapolated from a relatively small sample so there is potential for to be flawed (e.g. people with symptoms are more like to return their sample than those who don't have any). Also, accurately tracking new variants geographically needs a lot more samples. If the govt did have an accurate count of current cases they would be in a better position to keep track of it.

And I'm pretty sure a fair amount of recent govt policy/attitude to covid has been based upon the trends of the official count ('oh look, there's no much covid about currently, cases are decreasing' etc), when the reality is it's more a count of how many people are bothering to test and report their results.

I was tested in hospital so it's all logged automatically on my NHS app

I took find it strange that the number of people I know right now who are off work/ill are probably higher than ever before, but that no real interest or action is at play.

I reported mine, and yes it's now appeared on my GP online record.

That's the only reason I report it.