Drakeford defends not providing coronavirus tests to everyone in care homes

The First Minister of Wales has defended the decision not to follow England and provide coronavirus tests to all care home residents and workers.

The Welsh NHS is testing residents and staff who have symptoms, and First Minister Mark Drakeford said there was "no value" in offering tests to everyone.

Plaid Cymru said the decision was "offensive" as care home residents were "dying every day", while the Conservatives said it was "disappointing".

Mr Drakeford told the plenary: "The reason we don't offer tests to everybody in care homes, symptomatic and asymptomatic, is because the clinical evidence tells us that there is no value in doing so.

"Because of that, we don't do it. We offer the testing where the advice to us is that it's clinically right to do that.

"Testing people who have no symptoms today - for that to be a reliable message to them, you'd have to test them again tomorrow, because you can go from having no symptoms to having the symptoms in 24 hours.

"Using the capacity we have in that way would be to divert the capacity away from where it is clinically worthwhile to doing things where the clinical case for doing so is not one that has been advised to us, and that is why we're not doing it."

Mr Drakeford added: "We are working with the care home sector to consider a wider testing remit in those care homes where there is clearly an outbreak of coronavirus.

"The case for wider testing there may be clinically stronger. That's being explored by our clinicians with the care home sector."

Health Secretary Matt Hancock announced on Tuesday that all care home residents and staff will be able to access tests regardless of whether they have symptoms.

In Wales, the testing capacity had risen to 2,100 tests a day and the First Minister said a "different testing regime" would be needed once the lockdown restrictions are lifted.

"We will need a different testing regime as restrictions come to be lifted, because at that point, however carefully and however cautiously we go about it, the risk of coronavirus spreading in the community will be greater then than it is now under the conditions of lockdown," he told Assembly Members.

Welsh Conservative leader Paul Davies said: "It's absolutely essential that we have comprehensive community testing taking place across Wales to defeat this virus.

"It's disappointing to hear that the Welsh Government is choosing not to test all care home residents and staff."

Plaid Cymru local government spokeswoman Delyth Jewell said: "Data released by the Office for National Statistics showed that deaths from coronavirus occurring in care homes were much higher than initially thought, and there's an unexpected increase in deaths not attributed to Covid-19 in some health boards, which requires an explanation."