Impact on daily life

Impact. 21st September
New rules and fines from 28th September
If you are tested positive for the virus or have been in close contact with someone who has it, you have to self-isolate for 2 weeks.  If you don’t do this and are caught, then the fines start at £1,000 and go up to £10,000 if you continue.
If an employer says you have to go to work even if you have the virus or are self-isolating, then the employer gets fined.
If you are receiving benefits or are low income, then you can get a payment of £500 if you self-isolate.
Most schools now have kids not attending because they cannot get a test or who are waiting for a test result.  Nearly half of schools have staff not attending because they cannot get a test.  Big complaints from head teachers.
There seems to be an issue with one testing lab.  Randox in Northern Ireland was given a £133 million contract to process virus tests.  Other companies were not allowed to bid for the contract.  But less than half of the test it receives are processed within 24 hours.  On one day in September it was only one in 10 results were sent back.  They also rejected 12,400 tests because the swabs were not right.  Half a million of their kits sent out, were rejected by the NHS because they were not sterilised. They seem to have taken on too much work.  However, they are able to make a priority of tests from the Rugby Premier League who get there results back within 12-15 hours.  They employ a lot of students at £8.20 per hour and since the students go back to school and college now, there are possibly more problems.  The company seem to have connections to MPs but there are questions about how they have been allowed to be part of the testing programme of the UK’s health.

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