Morning all, apologies for asking another question about this! my workplace have now said that if a member of staff have tested positive for COVID they are to have an NHS negative COVID test before returning to work. Has anyone else heard this? surely it goes against guidance that is. Self isolate for 10 days dont leave house unless symptom free for 48 hours without symptoms? I cant find any info online that says you should get another test. Does anyone have any thoughts? thank you!

“before they can return to work” Does that means that they are being furloughed or suspended with no pay. It sounds like someone is looking to cut down on staff pay.

A negative test does not prove anything except that you do not have the virus at the time of the test. You can walk out of the test centre and be infected 5 minutes later, which is why the government does not support this approach and against the idea of a “covid passport”. Unless you test everyday and isolate between tests it’s pointless.

When the concept of testing for cause came out there were no facilities to support such action as the laboratories were already swamped and this was before the mass tesing regiemes implemented in areas such as Liverpool.

It was one of the reasons travellers could not shorten their return quarantine through paying for a test.

Of course your employer will likely say "it's only one test..." trouble is when everyone acts in the same manner a limited resource is rapidly consumed - stock pilers only take one pack of toilet roll but if everyone does it on the same day then the shelves are empty.

As AK has said the test would only prove a result (one way or another) at a very specific moment in time.

The negative test is a red herring and as a number of contributers have said it only proves that at the time of the test you were negative.  I would suggest that it is only valid until you leave the test centre.  So asking for a negative test does not prove anything. 

As a business we have said to employees throughout the pandemic that they must react to symptoms and follow the guidelines and above all inform the business what is going on.  

Unfortunately I cant say how effective this has been as until now we have had no positive cases within our workforce neither have we had any instances where an employee has to self isolate.  I guess we may have been lucky. 

Edited by user 06 January 2021 12:42:57(UTC)  | Reason: Spelling error

I wonder how reliable a negative test is anyway. Having had such a test whilst an in-patient and experienced how this was done presumably correctly by a trained and experienced nurse I have some doubts about how well samples will be taken by individuals with almost certainly only limited or no training. The quality of the result will obviously depend on the quality of the sample taken. So if a negative result is shown could this be because the sampling did not reach the places it needed to reach? How would we know?

Kate - so what do you think of the Government idea that school children should take their own swabs?

Kate - you might find this interesting reading: https://arc-w.nihr.ac.uk/news/coronavirus-how-accurate-are-coronavirus-tests/

Hi Kate

That covid column by MD is probably the best one around and a happy new year to Private Eye too-keep it up.

It should be essential reading for all Tory [mostly] politicians and those at cabinet level in particular.

Regards

Mike 

Its okay the "not children" in school can add it to their days activity. They are already expected to deal with the bodily functions of societies youngest - "fetch the Pink Stuff"!

I wonder what anyone thinks about this?

https://ccpgloballockdownfraud.medium.com/the-chinese-communist-partys-global-lockdown-fraud-88e1a7286c2b

Edited by user 25 January 2021 19:26:48(UTC)  | Reason: Hyperlink insert

Originally Posted by: stevedm

To answer the OP...we ask for and have done for more than a year now a negative test for any HCID that our staff contract before starting work.

Do you do so with respect to Covid (noting that it is not a HCID)?

New acronym HCID- see more on this https://fullfact.org/health/coronavirus-hcid/

Basically HCID- high consequence diseases refer to exotic infections with high mortality rates. So, we are talking abut things like Ebola etc.  When Covid 19 was first spotted PHE etc decided to class it as a HCID but they then downgraded it as they realised that the mortality rate was about  5%  not the higher mortality rates you get with the classic HCID which are in the region of 50-90%

Like many companies, a large number of employees where I work were told to work from home from March 2020. Those people are still working from home and have now been told that this will be the case until at least 30th September 2021, when it will next be reviewed. As Health & Safety Manager, my main focus has been on keeping our office and workshop (for those who can't do their job at home) Covid safe. I asked about DSE assessments, etc for our home workers, but was told by people above me that this is not required, as this is temporary and low risk, and that I must not pursue any further. The HSE say the following on their website:  "As an employer, you have the same health and safety responsibilities for home workers as for any other workers"

https://www.hse.gov.uk/toolbox/workers/home.htm

I appreciate that it's not easy to ensure our home workers are working in a safe environment, but feel there must be something that can be done for this, as well as ensuring they are feeling supported from a mental health perspective. 

I'm putting this out there to see if anyone can advise what other companies are doing in this area, as it must be a very common issue at the moment. Any comments gratefully received, thank you

Sounds like a breach of Employment Law