Seven days in medicine: 12-18 August 2020
BMJ 2020; 370 doi: https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj.m3243 (Published 20 August 2020) Cite this as: BMJ 2020;370:m3243
Covid-19
England tests new tracing app
A trial of England’s new covid-19 app launched this week. The app will initially be limited to the Isle of Wight, the London borough of Newham, and NHS volunteer responders throughout England. The NHS Test and Trace programme has worked with Google, Apple, and scientists at the Alan Turing Institute to develop the app, which the government said has been designed with privacy in mind. It will tell users to quarantine for 14 days if it detects that they have been close to someone else with a covid-19 diagnosis.
50m masks bought without tender are unusable
Fifty million face masks bought by the UK government as part of a £252m (€279m; $333m) contract at the height of the covid-19 crisis will not be used in the NHS because of safety concerns, the government admitted. The FFP2 masks, supplied under a contract awarded without advertisement or tender, have ear loops rather than head ties, and the fixings may not be adequate to protect NHS frontline staff from covid-19. (Full story doi:10.1136/bmj.m3147)
US has worst mental health from pandemic
Covid-19 has caused stress, anxiety, or great sadness in a third of US people—higher than in nine other high income countries, a survey by the Commonwealth Fund showed. People’s trust in …
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