8 February Gold Update from Huw
Published: 8 January 2021
Good afternoon everyone,
I chaired the 4 February 2021 Gold meeting, once again on behalf of Andrew Jones who is back from leave this week. I can confirm as the first order of business that our health protection response level was reviewed and remains at Enhanced.
This week we heard that the 7-day incidence rate continues to generally fall which is extremely encouraging. Recent surveillance data suggest that COVID-19 infections in Wales are decreasing in all regions of Wales. Whilst cases remain geographically widespread, the majority of local authority (LA) areas are seeing decreasing overall trends in confirmed case incidence in the most recent week. This is of course positive news. We must all remain vigilant however, particularly in light of the new Variants of Concern (VoC).
On Monday 1 February 2021, England announced an aggressive approach to handling the South African variant to include widespread testing of asymptomatic people around a non-travel related case. We have worked very closely with Welsh Government to advise on what the approach should be to manage the situation here in Wales.
At the request of the Chief Medical Officer for Wales, we took on the task of producing a framework document outlining the Welsh approach to identification and management of Variants and mutations of concern (VAMC).
This sets out a measured, risk-based approach which reinforces the need to stick to tried and tested principles of communicable disease control. Whilst mass community testing is a tool in our health protection armoury, there are other measures being implemented which include contact tracing, field epidemiological investigations, the use of border control measures and community and genomic surveillance for both imported cases and sporadic (de novo) community cases. Genomic surveillance is proving to be a powerful tool and an area in which our Pathogen Genomics (PenGU)teams in Wales are leading the way.
Whilst we have a role as the national public health body in Wales, other agencies have clear responsibilities as well. Welsh Government has stood up a coordination group to oversee the incident response to this and has appointed two Incident Directors.
Internally, Microbiology have been working closely with Improvement Cymru to continue to decrease turnaround times across all of our labs and we’re seeing the results of this work coming through. With a capacity of around 15,500 tests per day, our median turnaround time across all our labs in now 8 hours – and we continue to improve on this. I think it’s worth noting this outstanding achievement—not just the amount of work that has gone into these improvement projects but the involvement, enthusiasm and support of the microbiology lab staff who, working with improvement leads, have made this happen, all whilst delivering the day to day service.
Volumes of calls into the National Contact Centre (NCC) have been stable over the last few weeks at less than 200 calls per day. At the same time, Welsh Government and the regional Test Trace Protect (TTP) boards are moving ahead with setting up their own regional incoming lines. This helps us to set out our longer term succession plans as we eventually look to transition the NCC call handler response into our core operations..
Gold held an extended discussion about workforce and mobilisation and made two recommendations which will be tabled at Business Executive Meeting (BET). First is the recommendation to extend bank and agency contracts into the new financial year to assure our workforce models for the coming months.
And secondly, Gold discussed the mobilised workforce requirement for the response beyond 31 March and will be escalating a recommendation to BET on 15th February.
And finally, an update on staff vaccination – we’ve been working through staff groups based on JCVI guidance and have now vaccinated over 850 staff. Andrew Goodall, Chief Executive of NHS Wales, has now introduced the ‘gateway rule’ which enables us to move to groups 5 and 6 once the 50% mark has been reached for groups 1 through 4. The health boards will also be working to this updated prioritisation guidance which is intended to make sure that as the remaining cohort of groups 1 through 4 gets smaller, the vaccination slots can still be fully utilised. This also helps to ensure minimum waste of the vaccine doses.
On that specific point, a number of staff have booked vaccines through Public Health Wales and not turned up for their appointments. I would like to appeal directly to staff, if you cannot make your appointment for any reason, please let the vaccination team know so that we do not waste any vaccines.
As we head into a brand new week, I hope that each of you is able to find some time for whatever activities you enjoy that help you stay healthy and connected.
Cofion
Huw