Free Covid tests could be scrapped under new plans to save billions of pounds, with free tests to be given only in high-risk settings such as care homes. This would mean that a Covid passport system wherein people had to prove either that they had been vaccinated or that they had recently tested negative for the virus would place those who had chosen not to get vaccinated under further financial strain. France decided to start charging for tests straight after the introduction of vaccine passports was announced in July. The Telegraph has the story.
Discussions are under way in the Government to scale back the arrangements that allow everyone to get a lateral flow test and some people to get PCR tests without paying…
The new system could see free tests provided only in high-risk settings such as care homes, hospitals and schools, as well as for people with symptoms, though details are not yet agreed.
The U.K. is an international outlier on the issue, with Germany and France moving to end universal free testing this month
Britain also carries out many more tests than other countries, 4,022 per 1,000 people at the end of last month compared to 1,268 in Spain and 885 in Germany, according to Our World in Data.
The costs are sizable, with one insider citing it as the equivalent of 1p on income tax, and there are fears taxes would have to rise were the scheme to continue.
A Whitehall source supportive of ending mass free testing said: “It’s agreed that universal access isn’t sustainable or necessary given high vaccination levels.
“We now need to decide what the parameters should be that reasonably qualify access to free testing.” …
It is unclear where Boris Johnson is on the matter, but the Prime Minister is expected to have the ultimate say on whether and when the free mass testing system should change.
Downing Street is understood to be playing down the chances of mass free testing ending over the winter, given the ongoing Covid uncertainty.
Worth reading in full.
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Could be the first sensible decision from this government. The “pandemic” would disappear overnight.
This is all part of the coercion to have the jabs – it’ll be show your vaccine passport or your recent test results. How many times will they demand people get tested each week?
Or perhaps people might say, stay away if you have a high temperature or a persistent cough, with loss of taste or smell, but without symptoms you are not much of a risk.
Yes, but that assumes people will be given the choice to have tests or not!
Twice. Saw it on a motorway sign yesterday.
This government doesn’t do ‘sensible’.
Don’t think it will work like that – scrapping testing in most cases would be sensible but this doesn’t appear to be the aim here – it’s to transfer the cost of testing onto the unspiked as a further bully-boy tactic to try to force them to get “vaccinated”.
That’s exactly how it is officially “explained” in Germany – you have a free vaccine, so no more free testing because that would be “unfair” to the vaccinated taxpayers. Nevermind that it is just the government which is forcing the people into both the testing and the vaccine, the false dichotomy serves just fine.
False dichotomies have been a staple tactic of most governments during the Coronapanicm unfortunately!
And they know they will get away with it because the media won’t say anything, and the number of people who see it for what it is and refuse both options are a minority.
The more this goes on the more obvious it becomes. I realised this will happen, months ago. Damned if you do, damned if you don’t – in all in instances. Just trying to live outside of it all now, both physically, mentally, as best as I can. I’m giving them NOTHING of myself!
Yes, funny how within two years you can become a “social outcast” and be labeled a “second class citizen” just by doing… nothing.
‘For the first time in history, the ineffectiveness of a drug is being blamed on those who haven’t taken it’
Except that the motivating factor is undoubtedly to put financial pressure on the unvaccinated, making it harder for them to prove their worthiness to share spaces with the superior population.
I don’t do the crooked tests or the useless masks or the fake vaccines which are designed to kill those who are stupid enough to roll up their sleeves.
So you don’t fly anywhere. Which is OK, there are plenty of nice places to go in England.
Yes, look at the Nasty Nats and Dungford making Peking Piffle look libertarian!
Nor do I. But as a state employee it’s only a matter of time until I’ll told to prove my health status. At that point I’ll probably leave my career (after causing as much of a headache as I possibly can!)
you could continue and try to set up a “truly” free school – parents might love it.
Apparently what you have to do is to set up an academy that acts as a support to home schoolers.
But the vaxxports won’t. There’s no rational reason to impose them, and yet here they are in the Celtic Fringe, and they’ll be mandated in civilised regions as well once voluntary compliance plateaus.
“Testing” terrorised us into “vaccination”, and the “vaccines” got us to the social credit score apps. They were always the goal (with some fat profits for cronies along the way), so the preliminary pretences can now be dropped.
Now it’s just about power, and compliance.
That’s one reading of it. If they allow us to self-exempt from the vaccine and still allow ourselves into public with a QR code, then we’ll know it was all about social credit/technocracy and not deliberately murdering everyone!
A big IF.
The new rules from December already suggest otherwise.
I do hope that they were grounded in the desire to make the UK vaxx passports acceptable internationally and that the self-exemption option from masks, vaccination, vaxx passports etc. is so unassailable under common law that it will have to be reintroduced or be upheld domestically.
But we will probably have to fight for this in the courts- care workers dismissed first, then that s.e. from use of v.p. domestically.
I can imagine that they know that this is indeed the case and that they are just banking upon most people succumbing to the illegal coercion and their nudging anyway, and on many of the rest not having the info on or the guts to use these self-exemptions, a strategy sadly quite successful with masks.
“we will probably have to fight for this in the courts”
How many times have I read this? “The lawyers will save us!” “Nuremburg 2”.
The judges belong to The State, they have been bought and/or threatened, and they aren’t on the side of Justice. They have their eyes on a shiny new BMW, fat pension, and large house in the countryside.
I agree in general but not with regard to stuff that exists because it is grounded on common law.
I am sure that the government has some very smart and very Covidian lawyers, who all wanted to handle mask exemptions the same way as the Europeans, and some equally smart ones who convinced even them and that government that they can’t do that here.
A precedent for this is also the non-dom status and it’s resulting taxation options.
They, and in particular Labour, desperately wanted to get rid of it many times, but couldn’t, can’t and likely won’t, despite throwing their best legal minds at it, simply because it is based upon common law.
Therefore, see above.
Fingers xd.
non-doms one thing – suits their wealthy cronies, some of whom back both major parties financially so there was lip-service paid to ending non-doms to make little people believe all were to be taxed equally – the common law rules regarding the covid exemptions are whole other ball game. They would mostly need to be claimed by ‘little people’ [anybody considered to be worth anything would have been given saline vip shots so not seeking exemption]. I don’t see those CL exemptions surviving – but would love to be proved wrong!
The government does not have smart lawyers. They have second rate lawyers as they don’t pay. Simple.
Silly thinking, there is no self-exempt from anything corona-related anywhere in the world except in the UK. How long do you think this “freedom” will stand.
For as long as we do, meaning the ones that hold firmly on to the few rags of freedom and human dignity that we have left.
There’ll be an immediate reduction in cases, removing the embarrassingly high number of cases that we’ve got at the moment and offering proof that the vaccines finally work.
Of course, only unvaccinated folk will be taking the tests, so there’ll be even more proof that there are far more cases in the unvaccinated.
And, it’ll remove any hope of getting more robust data showing that after 6 months or so the vaccinated start having a higher risk of covid infection.
We’re going to have a substantial number of cases, directly impacting on the health of the vulnerable (as vaccine efficiency fades) but they’ll remove the data that’ll show it happening.
Well hopefully people who’ve chosen not to have the jabbyjab will also decline the passport app and thus decline testing too.
What! They want to make the hypochondriacs pay for their tests and only give them free to people with symptoms.
What heresy is this? Whoever suggested testing should only be done to determine the cause of symptons.
Oh, it was the test manufacurers’ guidelines, well what do they know about it?
I agree with your sentiments about the hypochondriacs. I have a friend double jabbed who tests himself twice a week as you ‘can’t be too careful’
These tests have been free at the point of delivery so most sheeple don’t think twice about doing them.
I predict an outcry from those on benefits who will say ‘we want to check ourselves but cannot afford it’.
I wonder also what the cost of these tests will be? Here in Thailand they are about 5.50p each. The only way you can get a test here for free is if you have symptoms – which in my opinion is as it should be. Bearing in mind the ‘tests’ are useless anyway.
“Britain also carries out many more tests than other countries, 4,022 per 1,000 people at the end of last month compared to 1,268 in Spain and 885 in Germany, according to Our World in Data.”
Sooo … Britain must have considerably lower deaths because of this marvellous health investment initiative?
No??????
Off topic but I see that Peru is one of 7 countries on the travel “red” list. Didn’t Peru have the longest and most draconian anti covid lockdowns and measures? So those actions worked well didn’t they!
Didn’t do any better than Brazil
Correct. Longest and hardest, with military enforcement. Worked out well, then.
Well, of course. The plandemic was only ever necessary to terrorise us into the required degree of “vaccination” to impose social credit score apps.
They are already here in the Celtic Fringes, with the usual incompetence, but that will soon be sorted and they will creep and creep. England will follow along soon enough once the Scotch and Welsh parish councils have flattened the bumpy curves in the road, with cries of “Now your freedoms can be fully restored! Conditionally. Papers, please.”
Having served its purpose, the “testing” regime can now be retired. After a while we’ll just lower our eyes and show our social credit score apps to every Day-Glo Denzil who demands them without question, or even remembering why they were “necessary”.
I think you’re on the right track here. Also remember that children are being used: “Mummy, Daddy, why haven’t you been vaccinated? I was, at school. The nurse was ever so nice. Don’t you care that Granny might get Covid?”
Kids already 19 months old today – all they’ve known is a world of face masks in the shops. 19 months of a ‘pandemic’ – ever had the feeling you’ve been well and truly ‘had’?
Have we yet had a limitation on the duration of vaccine effectiveness? In Israel I believe that you have to get yourself regularly vaccinated – perhaps every 6 months – to keep your passport up-to-date.
And, of course, the fully vaccinated can still catch the disease, and those who are aged and vulnerable will still die of it. This is becoming Pythonesque….
i think their plan has gone wrong.
I think the virus was supposed to be much more deadly and last longer, making 100% vaccination a slam dunk.
But instead we have a virus which isn’t very deadly, a vaccine which not only doesn’t work but makes things worse and has terrible side effects including death, all of which is increasingly obvious to even the sleepiest people and which makes the vaccine passport look like a barmy idea.
If the great reset was supposed to be a seamless integrated process which only became obvioust to the population when it was too late, well it hasn’t really worked.
People are also waking up to the realization that maybe the next part of the plan, the “climate crisis” is not that urgent either. The only nudge required to bring them back to reality were some temporary blackouts in China (which is now redoubling its coal burning), a lack of gasoline in the UK, and wholesale energy prices shooting up 9x in Germany. Perhaps we still need a bit more than a solar panel and a mask after all.
They thought they could control the whole world and all the people in it.
Fools.
It’s always hubris that sinks these people in the end.
Still, we’re not at the end yet.
It could be seen as swine flu mark II (‘tho you’d think they would have learned the lessons from that a little better) but nevertheless they seem to be pushing full steam ahead with their other agendas notwithstanding the supposed “failure” of the virus which was supposed to usher them in on its back. The world agreement on corporation tax looks to be part of it – the mad pushing of the green agenda everywhere – the broadly worldwide stance being taken that if you are not vaccinated you cannot travel etc
The only purpose was to bankrupt the country – perhaps they think they’ve done enough.
I suspect that this is the case too. I think there’s some way to go yet though; give it another winter…
supply chain breakdowns and gas price hiking looks like more manipulation (and a carbon levy to be added on top of those hiked prices) and very hard to justify considering china is ramping up the output of its coal fired power stations. Last time I checked we were all breathing the same air but it seems that it is only people in the UK who are expected to shiver through winter or have their business go bust because their gas prices are so high they are unaffordable
I have bought tickets for many near future gigs where the venues are demanding the following ……
Proof of a negative NHS Rapid Lateral Flow Test (such test to be taken within 24 hours prior to attending the event at the venue); or
Proof of full vaccination – both doses received (with the second at least 14 days prior to the arrival at the venue); or
Proof of natural immunity based upon a positive PCR test within 180 days of arrival at the venue (and after the 10-day self-isolation period following the result).
As an OAP rock and metal head who refuses to be vaccinated and my natural immunity via memory B and T Cells are not on the list I have just ordered the Lateral Flow Tests whilst they are still FREE.
You understand that your compliance with the system just ensures that it will never end, yes?
I bought very expensive tickets before Covid was a “thing” and the gigs were postponed until now.
I can’t get my money back.
Falsifying an LTF is not complying with the system.
Yes?
of course you’re complying. You’re providing evidence on demand that you’re healthy. It will never end if people who don’t believe in this aren’t taking a stand.
and I’m pretty sure you’re allowed a refund if the conditions of entry have changed.
How are you going to ‘falsify’ the LFTs?
Dip them in distilled water to ensure a negative result. If distilled water gives a positive, try cat’s pee, or anything else that does the job.
You are legally entitled to a full refund if gig is no longer taking place on the original date
I was told I couldn’t get my money back on some expensive plane tickets that had been turned into vouchers with an almost everlasting validity. Having no joy with customer service, I wrote to the chief executive and pointed out that the product was radically different to the product I had originally purchased, because of all the additional requirements and obligations on my part. I had my money returned within the week.
Having worked closely with CEOs, this is usually very effective, but even better is writing to the Chairman. He/she will just bat it back to the company, and the CEO is usually crapping themselves that the Chair will be on their backs, and order it sorted ASAP.
You should stop doing “gigs” and become unemployed as demanded by the government.
Try learning to read.
I don’t recall any performers buying tickets for their own gigs to avoid “become unemployed”….
Thanks for supporting these gigs that endorse totalitarianism and tyranny.
All you have to do is wave an actual ‘negative test’ thing at them. You could test your dog, your cat, a raw potato, anything. One thingy will do for weeks. If it’s tyranny, tyranny of this kind is a farce.
Just another step to introduce vaxx passports and coerce more people, especially the deplorables and BAME, into getting gene therapied and downloading the app ASAP.
Next step: reintroducing testing for the vaxxed, still paying for theirs. Initially.
Then, even they/everyone must get tested every day and pay for it.
Until they can’t afford it anymore and are forced to transfer their remaining assets to Uncle Klaus, rent everything from him and be happy.
I’m sure that this is old news to some on here but Canada seems to be neck and neck with Australia on who can become the most totalitarian western ‘liberal’ state –
https://rumble.com/vnhnob-trudeau-turns-millions-of-canadians-into-second-class-citizens.html
And. yet the BBC HAS A HEADLINE LIKE THIS….Covid in Scotland: More than 500 cases linked to TRNSMT festival .What a pointless,silly little story..” linked to” what does that even mean lets carry on being frightened people Those free tests arent going anywhere are they ??
Just another way to coerce people into jabbing, because you will have to now pay in order to prove your entry into any form of social life.
The government is taking off the Covid sticking plaster bit by bit rather than snatching it off all at once. The PTB think it will be less painful that way while still covering their own backsides.
Over the last few weeks on MSM, there has been a massive reduction in the number of articles written about Covid. It barely gets a mention these days. There is no longer a fanfare about jabbing the young or rolling out the booster shots. Masks are becoming rarer around here by the day.
I see this latest leak, by the Telegraph (where else?)as good news. Isn’t this what one of the developers of the AZ jab told us to do weeks ago-stop testing the healthy?
Forgot to include the link
https://www.smh.com.au/world/europe/astrazeneca-lead-scientist-says-delta-makes-mass-testing-pointless-in-uk-20210811-p58hpe.html
I think that you are forgetting the essential jab/apartheid policy agenda if you think that this is removing anything significant.
Hi Rick, no I haven’t forgotten. About a month ago, I posted a comment below the article on the vaccine passport scheme saying that, as there were still four more weeks of jabbing potential to go before the end of September, I didn’t expect the government to pull the rug until the very last minute, which of course, is exactly what it did do.
Health workers have until the 11th November to get both jabs, an appalling act of coercion, which will have succeeded in getting a few more jabs into arms, but not into every arm. I will be interested to see what happens to social care after that date.
It also seems to have gone very quiet in Scotland too after the omnishambles of passport introductions last week. What’s happening there?
So, I haven’t forgotten. I’m just watching and waiting, with a wry smile on my face.
So you are vaccinated with your pass, but in some cases people can still be infectious because you can still get the disease, maybe your symptoms are so mild you don’t noticed or you do notice symptoms but want to go clubbing anyway.
A vaccinated infectious person can get into the club, but a non-infectious unvaccinated person cannot. That is crass idiocy.
it’s no good saying vaccination reduces the number who might be infectious because we know the unvaccinated immune system is just as good at reducing the ‘mights’. And so what, infection spread and it is harmless to 99% of population – and 84 year olds with comorbidity don’t go to night clubs, football matches, etc.
It is not idiocy because the goal is no longer to reduce the spread, it is to infect everyone to gain that long-lasting immunity and credit the vaccines nonetheless. That way you can get over corona “crisis” (as you would in 2-3 years by doing nothing) and still keep filling pharma pockets for a long time after that while cementing your power and setting foundation for the authoritarian police states of the future.
Got it in one!
“With no Covid Pass, my wife and I are banished from society”
https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1446134032027176965.html
Apparently that guy has not discovered online shopping yet.
You’ve not been to Lithuania, have you?
Have you? when there, did you publicly express your support for the victims?
I think EF’s point was they probably don’t have anything like the ability to shop online there as opposed to here in the UK.
I don’t often resort to cheap personal abuse, but in this case, as we say in Britain, jog on
Or as they say in Italy, Ci fai o ci sei?
It’s not having to do online shopping that worries me most, it’s fundamentally about being forced offline from society.
Yeah, because obviously they should be banished from real life, right?
You clearly didn’t read the linked posts because he has also lost ALL income and they are banished from doing pretty much anything that will allow them to live at all.
You thick twat, you are just like “concrete68”, mostly a waste of air…
what happens to them when either what cash they have runs out or cash is discontinued when everything goes onto CBDC?
The most predictable and obvious evidence that this is a pandemic of fascist control and has nothing to do witha a virus. The jabs don’t prevent transmission so it can’t be about health.
No self-exemption from the jabs. No right to participate in society unless jabbed. And yet cases will still rise and fall but will simply be blamed on the unjabbed (who won’t have been anywhere to “infect” anyone).
I see jab freedom passes have already been expanded in scope for future application everywhere (“learning from other countries”). In which case the rigged vote last week wasn’t even a vote on what the Welsh govt were ACTUALLY proposing.
Well, you all know where Drakeford lives…
This just might be a turning point to raise significant anger from those who are “required” to have tests at the moment – e.g. because of their job – but are unstabbed and don’t intend to become so.
I think there are also quite a few of the stabbed who might get pissed off if they have family members who aren’t, and they were “required” to pay for tests to continue working.
Quite soon we just may reach a pivot point with all this BS – which way it will go of course, is another story entirely…
Oh, lol. It’s the jabbed taking most of the tests, same as it’s the jabbed wearing the face nappies and the jabbed who’ve downloaded the ‘ping and you’re isolated’ app. So it’ll be them paying for the tests. Anyone wants me to take a test, they’ll have to pay for it.
Pleased to report that I have never taken a single Covid test and have no plans to do so unless absolutely necessary. It goes without saying that I have never followed ANY governmental rules or guidelines, have had plenty of colds….. and nothing else.
I (neither jabbed nor tested) haven’t even had a cold,
Never mind. Clock’s ticking to the next GE
That is good. Fewer Covid tests, fewer “cases” and false positives. The sooner the better.
This pandemic unfolds like a brilliant Dutch film called Head Hunters – ultimately, to get away from the killers, the anti hero lowers himself into a tank of shit beneath an outdoor loo using a straw to breathe – and impossibly it gets even worse from there. Only this isn’t a comedy and anyone who is half poor and has self worth is being sunk daily into more shit – and the straw being offered is a poisonous steel prick in the arm. You gotta laugh.