COVID App Error Possibly Caused Thousands to Needlessly Isolate, Media Says

The matter regarding the app was reportedly brought to the attention of the former Health Secretary Matt Hancock shortly before his resignation, but it wasn't until a month later that his successor Sajid Javid announced that the app would be updated.

Thousands of people in the United Kingdom may have isolated for no reason due to an error with the NHS COVID app, The Guardian reports citing a source in Whitehall.

As the newspaper points out, while official guidelines for the app "defined close contact as occurring two days before the infected person had symptoms," users apparently weren’t told that the app could "notify of contact with an infected person as far back as five days before the positive test."

"The standard definition of a contact in all the scientific and public stuff from Public Health England and NHS test and trace is someone who has been in contact from two days before they have symptoms and if they don’t have symptoms but test positive, you go back two days from the test," the source said. "But the app had five days in it."

They also mentioned that this matter was apparently brought to the attention of former Health Secretary Matt Hancock shortly before his resignation.

"A submission was made to Hancock from test and trace people around the time of his resignation saying ‘it’s five days but it should be two days: should we change it now? And it didn’t happen,’" the source remarked.

The Labour Party has apparently used this opportunity to take pot shots at the government, with Shadow Health Minister Justin Madders calling it "another shambolic situation from hapless ministers."

"The COVID app has been one mess after another and a lack of clear information and guidance around the app only undermines its effectiveness," he said.

About a month after that, Hancock’s successor, Sajid Javid, said that the app would be updated in order to have the contacts of people who tested positive for COVID tracked from the last two days instead of five.

The health secretary reportedly said that it was being "updated based on public health advice to look back at contacts two days prior to a positive test."

The Department of Health and Social Care didn't challenge the whistleblower’s account, the newspaper notes, adding that the department is "making the case that the COVID app had different definitions of a close contact to test and trace, with a five-day period chosen for the asymptomatic because it is the halfway point in a potential 10-day infectious period."