Coronavirus testing chaos in Aylesbury means children unable to return to school

The Bucks Herald has received several reports of people being unable to get tests in Aylesbury, despite vacant testing centres.
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Have you been affected? [email protected]

Earlier this month The Bucks Herald received reports of people being sent as far afield as Ebbw Vale, and Edinburgh and Essex to get a Coronavirus test.

Town Councillor Rich Lloyd said that he went to a manned test site this morning in Aylesbury, which he claims was deserted, but was unable to receive a test.

He said: "We have a pop up test centre which you can't book online and if you turn up on the day they just won't test you.

"The centres are fully manned but it's just sitting empty. It's an absolute farce.

"Kids are being kept off school which sends whole families into lockdown until they get tested - but they can't get tests!"

Jason Middleton said his whole family were being kept off work because one of their children had corona-like symptoms.

He said: "The whole process has been so frustrating."

"We understand that it's a difficult time for everyone involved at the moment, but it's been a nightmare trying to get a test for our son so we can get him back to school."

On Monday, Jason's son was sent home after cold-like symptoms had developed into a cough.

The school were naturally concerned, so sent him home on the proviso that he could return if he could get a test.

However the Middleton family have been met with brick wall after brick wall in a bid to get tested for Coronavirus.

Jason added: "We've tried the website, calling, but we can't even get to the bit where you put your details in, we've just been repeatedly met with the phrase 'service is busy, try again later'.

"When we finally got through we were just met with the message that there was no walk ins available throughout the UK."

After being reaching a dead end, they went to the drive through testing facility at Gatehouse Way this morning, but were told that they could not get a walk in test.

Jason added: "The whole site was deserted, with people just standing around waiting. My wife explained to the staff what had happened and that our son couldn't return to school until he was tested, but they replied they couldn't test him without an appointment.

"The system is clearly broken and not working. I've emailed Rob Butler so hopefully he can help with the issue."

The Sun Newspaper reported last night that there were no tests are available in any of the country’s top 10 Covid-19 hotspots.

This has left thousands of children unable to return to school.

The government is tackling a backlog of 185,000 swabs and has even resorted to sending tests abroad in a bid to get results.

The shortage applies to all three tests available - home testing kits, drive-through sites and walk-ins.

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