Nearly half of NHS workers were infected with Covid during peak of epidemic, top scientists claim
NEARLY half of NHS workers were infected with Covid during the peak of the epidemic, leading scientists claim.
Sir Paul Nurse, Francis Crick Institute director, told MPs today that "up to 45 per cent" of healthcare workers were infected in April.
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But a lack of testing meant most cases went undetected as the majority were asymptomatic.
He was speaking at the Health and Social Care Committee which has met to hear evidence as part of the committee's inquiry into the management of the coronavirus outbreak.
Sir Nurse said: "My colleagues in the Crick contacted Downing Street in March, wrote to minister (Matt) Hancock in April, emphasising two main things.
"The importance of regular, systematic testing of all healthcare workers, including not only frontline doctors and nurses, support staff, ambulance drivers, other healthcare providers such as the care homes, GP surgeries, community nurses and the like. And these all needed to be tested.
"At the height of the pandemic, our own research, and of course that only backs up what's been done elsewhere, is that up to 45 per cent of healthcare workers were infected.
"And they were infecting their colleagues, they were infecting patients, yet they weren't been tested systematically."
Oxford University immunologist Sir John Bell accused the NHS of burying its head in the sand over testing.
And he slammed health bosses as unethical for delays in screening frontline workers for the bug.
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Speaking to MPs, the Government adviser said: "As time went on, there still wasn't a real push to do [screen for Covid] healthcare workers.
"And it sort of went on, and on, and on. And indeed there was a suspicion, which I think is probably correct, that NHS institutions and the NHS were avoiding testing their hospital workers because they were afraid they would find the kind of levels that Paul's described [45 per cent infection], and they would have to send everyone home, and as a result not have a workforce.
"That in my view is not an ethical approach to the problem. You can't not test people because you're worried about a human resources issue.”
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