Page 17 - Jon Deeks News Today : Breaking News, Live Updates & Top Stories | Vimarsana

Concerns have resurfaced amid calls from France to use gold standard PCR tests at the border 22 December 2020 • 5:54pm Boris Johnson views a PCR diagnostics machine in a lab during a visit to the Public Health England site at Porton Down science park on November 27 Credit: Adrian Dennis - WPA Pool French demands for “gold standard” PCR tests to be used at the border come amid fears that the accuracy of lateral flow tests “cannot be relied on”. Both tests are diagnostics that tell individuals whether or not they currently have Sars-Cov-2 - unlike antigen or serology tests, they do no...

The Prime Minister has said the Government wants secondary school pupils to return to lessons in a staggered way in the new year if they “possibly can”. He said the “commonsensical thing to do” was to follow the path of the epidemic. Labour’s letter to the Education Secretary calls on the Government to publish scientific evidence on the spread of the virus in schools and colleges – and the risk this poses to students, staff and the community. It demands that the Government puts in place plans to safeguard vulnerable children in the event that schools and colleges close. Last week,...

Rapid coronavirus tests that Britain spent more than £600million on could pick up as few as three per cent of people infected with the virus, a study has suggested. A trial of the Innova Tried & Tested lateral flow test on students at the University of Birmingham 'raises some serious questions about the value of mass-testing'. The rapid test, which can produce results within 15 minutes and is being widely used in the first phases of Operation Moonshot to test asymptomatic people and curb the spread of the virus, was pitted by officials as a new way to keep cases under control and potentially...

Uni students with Covid may have wrongly received negative test results due to “rushed” and “inaccurate” testing ahead of the Christmas break, a University of Birmingham study has discovered. Results from the study showed that lateral flow tests conducted on Birmingham students had missed positive Covid test results, which were discovered when students were retested with another testing method. The study shows that only 3 per cent of Covid cases were correctly identified. Lateral flow tests involve a student taking a self swab which is then mixed with a “buffer solution” by a trai...

January school closures considered as fears grow over new Covid strain's spread among children Government scientists concerned that children may be fuelling fresh surge of virus across the country 21 December 2020 • 9:30pm Minister are considering keeping schools closed for all of January amid fears that the new Covid-19 strain is spreading faster among children, The Telegraph understands. Government scientists said they were concerned that children may be fuelling a new surge of the virus across the country as cases rose by 55 per cent in single week. Teaching unions have written to Boris ...