Concerns surrounding the effectiveness of lateral flow testing have been swirling since the end of last year. A December report warned of the marginal effectiveness of lateral flow testing, with Public Health England lab experiments finding the tests to only successfully pick up on 77 per cent of positive Covid-19 cases. Innova Tried & Tested, the American lateral flow company that piloted the mass Birmingham testing, also claims its tests are 76 per cent effective. After the real-world Liverpool trial, however, the government were eager to argue a tangible 50 per cent effectiveness in England and claim this brought the city cases down by two thirds, which University of Birmingham (UoB) professor Jon Deeks disputes the data does not conclude this. In contrast, another study deemed the lateral flow tests only three per cent effective as a whole. 

Back in December, the Birmingham trial of the Innova Tried & Tested lateral flow tests, taken place at the UoB Great Hall, was originally estimated to have missed 60 positive tests on average, with two missed positive cases confirmed. The testing is currently being used for asymptomatic testing across England, particularly in high-risk areas.

However, a staggering new statistic challenges the government’s sense of security with lateral flow testing, which researchers have criticised. UoB professor, Jon Deeks, who has been a lead researcher, told ITV News: ‘Our evaluation in Birmingham was a shock to me. We tested 7,100 students before they went home. We missed 97 percent of the students who would have been positive on PCR.’ He comments on the failure: ‘That’s a very, very bad rate.’

Meanwhile, the government reports that the rapid tests have found 54,000 positive cases of those without Covid-19 symptoms so far. The failure of the UoB trial has been attributed to the use of self-testing rather than more effective swabbing administered by trained professionals.

In response to the statistic arising from UoB’s trial, Lord Bethell, Minister for Innovation and the Department of Health, commented ‘I don’t recognise those figures.’ However, he goes on to praise the achievement of Operation Moonshot, stating ‘They found 874 positive tests in Liverpool. That’s an amazing achievement. Those are people who were out in the community, had no idea they had the infection, potentially giving the disease to people they love and work with.’

Conflicting newly-published scientific modelling suggests that lateral flow testing is useful in finding the most infectious cases. The study further claims daily lateral flow testing could be as effective as fourteen days of quarantine. The Liverpool and Birmingham trials are the only field tests so far carried out in the UK to assess the effectiveness of lateral flow testing. 

The next trials of scientific accuracy are currently set to take place in schools for the children of key workers, where social distancing measures have proven disproportionately difficult to enforce. The government is hoping to use this testing to keep pupils who have been exposed to the virus in school instead of quarantining.

Operation Moonshot is estimated to come at the cost of 100 billion pounds. MP Meg Hillier, Chair of the Public Accounts Committee, claims the project ‘has no real plan behind it.’ In conjunction, barrister Jolyon Maugham testifies ‘100 billion pounds is most of what we spend on the entire NHS in a year.’ The Department of Health declined to give a figure. When confronted with the sensitive leaked cabinet documents from September confirming the £100 billion estimate, Lord Bethell, Minister for Innovation and the Department of Health, denied the figure altogether, stating ‘I wasn’t in cabinet. You weren’t in cabinet. And I don’t recognise the figure.’

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