SNP’s increased testing capacity means nothing unless properly used

26 May 2020

Nicola Sturgeon’s pledge on increased testing will be meaningless unless more capacity is used, the Scottish Conservatives have said.

Analysis by the party has revealed that the combined daily tests rarely hit 50 per cent, with only 4742 being carried out on Sunday, well short of the 10,000 aim.

In fact, the Scottish Government has never met the 10,000-a-day target previously set out by the First Minister.

Yet she said today that by increasing that capacity to 15,000, more testing would be completed.

She also backed down on previous claims that 2000 contact tracers would be in place by the end of the month, instead saying only 700 were needed to launch the test, trace and isolate scheme.

Scottish Conservative leader Jackson Carlaw said:

“Nicola Sturgeon could have as large a testing capacity as she likes – but it won’t matter a bit if people aren’t actually being tested.

“Every day the SNP government falls well short of the target to test 10,000 a day, and more often than not misses that target by half.

“That leaves thousands of care home residents, workers and their families untested, and that’s why we’re seeing such a crisis in these facilities.

“The SNP government just hasn’t done enough to get the tests out to those who need it most.

“Exiting lockdown will be dependent on this test, trace and isolate system, and we very much want that to succeed.

“But until the issue of testing is sorted, there is little hope that it will.”