LONDON - The UK will survey 20,000 households in a bid to track the spread of the coronavirus, five weeks after it abandoned a strategy of community testing - a decision that left officials in the dark over the true spread of the disease.
Though medics rigorously tracked the virus at the beginning of the outbreak and quarantined people as necessary, the government dropped the strategy on March 12 due to a lack of capacity and a belief that the disease had already spread too widely for it to be useful. Chief Medical Officer Chris Whitty said on Wednesday that any relaxing of restrictions imposed on March 23 would still need to ensure the transmission rate remains below 1, meaning each Covid-19 case is passed on to less than one other person.
Pressure is building on the government to outline how it plans to lift restrictions, even from members of Prime Minister Boris Johnson's own Conservative Party. Hancock told Parliament that a National Health Service app to assist with the so-called track and trace of cases is in"beta trials" which are"going well." The aim is to have a system in place within weeks, he said.
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