Coronavirus: Drakeford pledges to speed up test results

Laboratory worker conducts tests

There is capacity to carry out 9,500 tests a day in Wales

The Welsh Government's "ambition" is to process coronavirus tests more quickly, according to the first minister.

The government's scientific advisers say the "most successful" contact tracing systems "require test results within 24 hours".

But only two-thirds of Wales' tests results are returned in 24 hours, figures have shown.

Mark Drakeford said he "absolutely" agreed with his scientific advisers that test results needed to be quicker.

He said Wales has capacity to carry out 9,500 tests daily in Wales, with extra capacity in England.

"We're doing around 3,000 tests a day and that means that we will be able to do more of those tests, more quickly," he told BBC Politics Wales."Our ambition is to have as many of them as possible done within 24 hours so that if people don't test positive we can release people back into the workforce and that's a moving picture," he added.

Mr Drakeford also repeated the possibility of introducing localised lockdowns.

Some tests are conducted at drive-through test centres

"Up until now our approach has been to do everything on an all-Wales basis and there are very good reasons for that," he said.

"But if the future pattern of coronavirus is that what we will see will be very local flare-ups of it, and our 'test, trace, protect' system will enable us to identify that, as will our membership of the Joint Biosecurity Centre, then a better way of dealing with that might be to deal with the consequences very locally as well."

Last week, the finance minister said local lockdowns were not being considered in Wales as imposing different rules could cause a "great deal of confusion".

Asked why the Welsh Government had changed its mind, Mr Drakeford said: "Sending a single message across the whole of Wales gets that message over more clearly but it's an if, not a definite.

"It's if the pattern becomes that what we are seeing is local flare-ups then we will have local action to tackle it," he added.

Scientific advisors say the speed of test results is important for effective contact tracing

The "test, trace, protect" system launched last Monday sees the close contacts of people who have tested positive for coronavirus asked to self-isolate for 14 days.

The highest "number of contacts that people were being asked to follow up" on one day last week was 82, whilst the lowest daily total was 35.

In a paper on 19 May, the Welsh Government's scientific advisors said "speed of testing and tracing" is the most important factor in producing an effective contact tracing system.

But official statistics show that on 31 May, only 62.3% of the results of coronavirus tests conducted in hospital were received within 24 hours.

The figure dropped to 57.5% of tests at drive-through centres and 55.5% of tests at coronavirus testing units - the worst set of figures for both settings since weekly test results were first published at the end of April.

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