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| Health workers on frontline to be tested in England | Health workers on frontline to be tested in England |
| (32 minutes later) | |
| Health workers on the frontline in England will start being tested this weekend to see if they have coronavirus, the government has announced. | Health workers on the frontline in England will start being tested this weekend to see if they have coronavirus, the government has announced. |
| Tests will be rolled out to critical care doctors and nurses first followed by staff in emergency departments, paramedics and GPs. | Tests will be rolled out to critical care doctors and nurses first followed by staff in emergency departments, paramedics and GPs. |
| It follows mounting criticism from NHS staff over a lack of testing. | It follows mounting criticism from NHS staff over a lack of testing. |
| Currently, only seriously-ill patients in hospital are being tested. | Currently, only seriously-ill patients in hospital are being tested. |
| At the daily press conference on the virus epidemic, Cabinet Office minister Michael Gove said antigen testing - which checks whether people currently have the disease - would give health and social care workers "security in the knowledge that they are safe to return to work if their test is negative". | At the daily press conference on the virus epidemic, Cabinet Office minister Michael Gove said antigen testing - which checks whether people currently have the disease - would give health and social care workers "security in the knowledge that they are safe to return to work if their test is negative". |
| He added: "These tests will be trialled for people on the frontline starting immediately, with hundreds to take place by the end of the weekend - dramatically scaling up next week." | He added: "These tests will be trialled for people on the frontline starting immediately, with hundreds to take place by the end of the weekend - dramatically scaling up next week." |
| Sir Simon Stevens, chief executive of NHS England, said it was "urgently important that we are able to test frontline workers who are off sick or otherwise isolating". | |
| He said that would mean the number of tests carried out doubling by the end of next week. | |
| And he indicated that testing would be widened out to cover more workers, including essential public service workers and social care workers, as capacity was increased. | |
| Testing of patients was "vital" and will continue, Sir Simon added. |