Ministers are considering slashing the quarantine period for people who test positive for Covid from ten to seven days.
As reported in Saturday’s Daily Mail, health experts, MPs and business leaders have called for a change, warning that the current rules risk crippling healthcare and the economy.
Anybody infected by the virus should isolate within ten days of first becoming symptomatic or after testing positive.
But the ‘blunt tool’ fails to account for infectiousness and is fuelling ‘lockdown by stealth’ by keeping so many people at home.
Anybody infected by the virus should isolate within ten days of first feeling symptoms, or testing positive.
The government’s scientific advisors have now shown it can be reduced the isolation time without affecting infection rates. If people get negative tests before being released, it will likely reduce that period.
Sources say the change in policy is ‘being looked at’ to stop the country grinding to a halt.
Even Professor Neil Ferguson of Imperial College London has backed it. His doom-laden predictions prompted earlier lockdowns.
Asked on BBC Radio 4’s Today programme on Saturday how he would feel about reducing quarantine to seven days, Professor Ferguson said: ‘All the modelling and analysis would suggest if it’s coupled with lateral- flow testing it’s not going to reduce the effectiveness of the measure that much.’
This is even with the support of Professor Neil Ferguson from Imperial College London.
Tory MP Peter Bone backed a change, saying: ‘We need a more sophisticated policy that can help get people back to work as soon as possible.’
Officials estimate a million people a day could soon be infected with the Omicron variant, which would leave ‘swathes’ of the population interned. This could lead to a collapse of the economy, with bars and restaurants suffering from a shortage of workers. Emergency services will also suffer.
The number of NHS staff in London absent due to Covid has more than doubled in four days and one in three of the workforce would be absent by New Year’s Eve if the growth rate continues.
Patricia Marquis, the Royal College of Nursing’s England director, said such a situation would be ‘catastrophic’.