The tale of Covid-19 continues to move forward here in Liverpool City Region, as we move from Tier 3, into national lockdown alongside the rest of the country.
Here at Growth Platform, we continue to support our local businesses within the ever-changing landscape they are faced with. Please don’t forget, if you need any help and support you can find out more information here.
More recently, we’ve been given the unique opportunity as a City Region to pilot a mass testing initiative. We know that as a City Region (and the wider North West) we’ve been hit much harder in the recent months in relation to Covid-19, with cases increasing & more pressure added to our local health and care services. This pilot will give us the opportunity to drive down transmission and infection rates and understand patterns in relation to the virus to help take action to break chains of transmission. The programme aims to test up to 50,000 people a day once fully operational. The facilities are providing lateral flow tests with a turnaround time of under an hour, for people who live and work in the city and do not have symptoms. You can find your local testing centre here.
It’s not surprising that we’ve been selected to support the first pilot of this kind given the assets & expertise we have here when it comes to Infectious Disease. We have key strengths sitting with the Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine (LSTM), University of Liverpool & a cluster of well-connected NHS Trusts.
Alongside this, we have a fantastic community that have proven many times that they can come together & unite to support each other.
Liverpool City Region has an opportunity to showcase all of this and prove the benefits of mass testing which has the potential to be a game changer when it comes to fighting Covid-19. If we can come together in support of this pilot (and it’s very clear that many have already done so!) then hopefully we can come out of national lockdown into a lower tier ahead of Christmas.