Contact tracers face increasing abuse in Scotland
The Chief Medical Officer issues a plea for patience
It has emerged Test and Protect staff are facing rising abuse when telling people to self-isolate in Scotland.
Dr Gregor Smith made the revelation in response to our question at the First Minister’s coronavirus update.
“One of the features we are seeing occasionally more often now, being reported from our teams, is that when they are contacting the public and asking them to isolate there are more cases of people beginning to be abusive to them.”
It has prompted the Chief Medical Officer to issue a plea to respect staff: “I ask people, please be patient with these teams, listen to what they have to say, they are trying their very best to make sure that we are all remaining protected and please heed their advice.”
'Struggling to cope'
It comes as concerns are raised that contact tracing is failing to keep up with record Covid cases.
The proportion of test and protect cases closed within 24 hours halved from a peak of 80% in early April to 40% in June.
A third of cases hadn’t been completed by the time the most recent Covid-19 statistical report was published last week.
Scottish Labour health spokesperson Jackie Baillie is now urging the Scottish Government to make extra resources available: “Once again, our test and protect system is reaching breaking point. Staff are working tirelessly to keep on top of the growing number of cases, but the system simply cannot cope.”
Responding to the concerns at the briefing, Nicola Sturgeon said Test and Protect officials would be under more strain with rising cases numbers but had the ability to “flex their resources” to meet the demand.
The First Minister also insisted contact tracing teams were still meeting World Health Organization targets:
“If I look at the most recent figures for the week up to June 20, against the WHO criteria of 80% of new cases having close contacts traced and in quarantine within 72 hours of cases confirmation, the performance for Test and Protect was 95.4%. It’s meeting that target, but we continue to assess.”