SCOTT Wright’s article on calls for mass testing (“Case for mass testing builds as restrictions get ever tighter”, The Herald, October 16) is a welcome call to action. We have gone well past the efficacy of periodic lockdowns in dealing with this virus.
As Edinburgh academics advised in a BBC Disclosure show back in May, the key to control is “shoe leather epidemiology”, systematically checking a given population for infection.
Can I make a further suggestion as to a useful starting point? As I’ve noted before on your Letters Pages, asymptomatic younger people should be the first group targeted and since young people enjoy socialising, why not use the shuttered pubs as de facto test centres? A negative test wins you an ID card (with time-limited currency of course), to be shown when accessing public enclosed spaces – including pubs. As I wrote here before, certainly we need to test, test, test but we also need to immediately target, target, target.
Alistair…
