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* Britain targeting 100,000 tests a day by month-end
* Official says testing need will increase dramatically
* Government wants money back for unreliable antibody tests
(Adds quotes, details of conference call)
By Alistair Smout
LONDON, April 8 (Reuters) - Britain said on Wednesday it
aimed to roll-out millions of coronavirus tests in months after
criticism that it had moved too slowly on the issue, adding that
a partnership with private firms would help it hit 100,000 tests
a day by the end of April.
The move came after England's Chief Medical Officer conceded
on Tuesday that there were lessons to learn from Germany and
Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab testing said there was "more work
to do" on testing.
A British official on Wednesday also said that the
government was looking to get its money back after ordering
antibody tests which didn't work.
The Department of Health said that a new testing laboratory
set up by AstraZeneca, GSK and Cambridge
University would aim to carry out 30,000 tests a day by May, and
Thermo Fisher would continue to supply the UK with testing kits
and aim to scale up manufacturing.
Government testing adviser John Newton said the 100,000
daily test target was feasible, and that 20,000 National Health
Service workers had already been tested.
"Testing capacity now is not what we would like, but it is
by no means inconsiderable in terms of what we need," Newton
told lawmakers on Wednesday.
"We do anticipate that the need will increase dramatically,
and therefore we want to get as much testing in place as
possible."
"NOT GOOD ENOUGH"
The government also said a business consortium had launched
plans to develop an antibody test, in order to detect those who
have been infected with COVID-19 and therefore had immunity.
But otherwise officials played down the urgency of producing
such tests compared to the antigen tests, which establish
whether a person has the disease currently.
Health minister Matt Hancock said last week that Britain
wanted to buy 17.5 million antibody tests, subject to them
working, but none of the tests have proven fit for purpose.
Kathy Hall, director of COVID-19 testing strategy at
Department for Health, said that having bought some of the tests
already to trial them, the government was now looking to cancel
orders and get their money back.
And in a call with diagnostic firms on Wednesday, Hancock
focussed on how they could help develop antigen testing rather
than the antibody tests, according to one participant.
Newton said he did not expect antibody tests to be widely
available by the end of April and would not rely on them to
contribute to the target, even though some laboratory-based
tests were beginning to come on stream.
"They all work, to some extent, but they're just not good
enough to rely on," Newton said of the antibody tests.
"Because the requirement for those tests is a little bit
down the line, the judgment was made that it's worth taking the
time to develop a better antibody test before rolling it out."
(Reporting by Alistair Smout; editing by Estelle Shirbon)
