COVID TESTING PROGRAMME NEEDED

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 Friday, March 20, 2020 - 11:16

Gibraltar needs to roll-out a systematic and comprehensive testing policy of people presenting COVID19 type symptoms on a far wider scale than it has previously.

The Leader of the Opposition, Keith Azopardi said: “We understand the issues that have made this difficult in previous weeks but we trust that as from next week when it is technically possible to do so in Gibraltar the Government will ensure that this is done as a priority. 

"This is important at different levels. We need to have a better source of local statistical information as the more recent COVID19 cases are suspected of having been locally contracted. We have seen exponential growth in other countries on a daily basis whilst locally for a period as long as a week there was no official increase in detected COVID19 cases. It is simply unrealistic to believe this is accurate.

"Research suggests that the number of undetected cases in a country far exceed the detected cases. That being the case we need to understand how the virus is spreading in Gibraltar. This will also allow us to gauge the effectiveness of the preventative measures and whether a general lockdown is necessary. "Although at the moment the strain on the health services has not been felt in a significant way we need to ensure we collate data to monitor the effectiveness of what we are doing to ensure our health service is not stretched to breaking point in an unexpected way because we did not realise that the spread was already out of control.”

20-03-2020 PANORAMAdailyGIBRALTAR