Government considered ‘London-specific lockdown’

The UK Government considered only imposing lockdown measures on London, before agreeing to implement them nationwide, Health Secretary Matt Hancock has revealed.

Mr Hancock also said eligibility for coronavirus testing would be expanded to cover police, fire service, prison staff, critical local authority workers, the judiciary and DWP staff, after demand for testing in the NHS was lower than expected.

Giving evidence to the Commons Health Committee via video link, Mr Hancock told MPs that the government had considered a "London-specific lockdown" before deciding that “it was better to do it across the country as a whole.”

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"That's for two reasons,” he said. “The first is that if you put a lockdown in one part of the country, then there's still travel from there to the rest of the country, so it isn't as easy as that.

"And the second reason is that actually one of the really strong things that's come through this crisis is that the country is acting in lockstep."

He said that the country had "come together" in response to the social distancing measures.

"To separate off one part of the country from the rest actually has downsides in terms of the national unity that we've seen in support for the overall response," he added.

Mr Hancock said it was “frustrating” that despite pressure to increase the number of coronavirus tests, there was capacity for 10,000 more tests to be carried out.

"Within the NHS, the number of staff coming forward for testing is lower than was anticipated,” he said.

"You'll understand why we had a priority order for the use of the test where it was patients first, then NHS staff.

"Frankly, the number of NHS staff coming forward wasn't as high as expected and therefore we extended it very quickly both to residents and staff in social care.

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"But because capacity is going up sharply, I'm therefore able to expand it further and we'll expand it again as soon as the capacity is there to make sure that that capacity is used up."

Following reports that some hospital trusts have warned they will run out of protective gowns over the weekend, Mr Hancock has admitted the UK is "tight on gowns" but that 55,000 more are due to arrive today.

"As of this weekend we will have shipped 1 billion items of personal protective equipment across the UK - so this is a... I've called it a Herculean effort before, it is a massive undertaking,” he said.

"And it is understanding in a massive undertaking like that that there are complications and that there are challenges and I take responsibility for getting PPE out to everyone."

He added: "We are tight on gowns, that is the pressure point at the moment. We have another 55,000 gowns arriving today and we're working on the acquisition internationally of more gowns, but it is a challenge.

"And this follows changing the guidance 10 days ago which increased the advice on the use of gowns but also said that they should be used for sessional use rather than for individual patient use.

"And it is a big challenge delivering against that new guidance and we're doing everything we possibly can."

Mr Hancock was asked by Commons Home Affairs Committee chairwoman Yvette Cooper why there was no guidance asking people travelling into the UK to self-isolate as a precaution.

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Mr Hancock said: "It is not, I'm advised by the epidemiologists, it is not an epidemiologically significant route of transmission in the UK because the current incidence is high.

"Of course, if we succeed in getting the incidence of transmission lower and much lower, which I hope we will, then you have to ask the question of how to protect the UK from people who have been in a place where that incidence of transmission is much higher."