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Coronavirus: Screening

Question for Department of Health and Social Care

UIN 107041, tabled on 21 October 2020

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what estimate he has made of the proportion of positive covid-19 tests recorded in respect of patients tested 7-10 days after initial infection and who are no longer likely to be infectious.

Answered on

25 November 2020

Current United Kingdom guidance is that testing should be undertaken for people who have a new onset of symptoms, and official advice is to get a test as soon as possible after the onset of symptoms. Data related to the time that a swab test is undertaken relative to the time of infection or the time of symptom onset is not routinely collected. Further information on testing is available at the following link:

https://www.gov.uk/guidance/coronavirus-covid-19-getting-tested