Ten million antibody tests ordered for UK

Britain has agreed to acquire more than ten million coronavirus antibody tests from Roche and Abbott to roll out to health and care workers from next week.

Health secretary Matt Hancock confirmed the UK Government had signed contracts to supply the antibody tests.

He told yesterday’s UK coronavirus briefing: “We’ve signed contracts to supply in the coming months over ten million tests from Roche and Abbott. From next week we will begin rolling these out in a phased way, at first to health and care staff, patients and residents. The UK Government has arranged supplies of these tests on behalf of the devolved administrations and each devolved nation is deciding how to use its test allocation and how testing will be prioritised and managed locally.

“This is an important milestone and it represents further progress in our national testing programme.” The antibody tests show who has been infected, although it is not yet clear whether the presence of antibodies to the new coronavirus, Sars-CoV-2, confers permanent immunity.