Derbyshire care home staff positive for Covid-19 despite having no symptoms

Derbyshire County Council tests all of its care home staff for Covid-19 each week and its care home residents each month.

Since September 21, the council says that 18 staff members and two residents have tested positive for the virus through asymptomatic testing.

In the past week (October 12 to 18) nine council care home staff and one resident tested positive for the virus.

A county council spokesman said: “We continue to regularly test staff and care home residents in line with the Government’s whole home care testing regime.

“The health and well-being of our employees and the people we look after is our highest priority. We’d like to thank all our staff on the frontline who are doing an incredible job in very difficult circumstances to ensure vulnerable people continue to be supported.

“We continue to have good stocks of personal protective equipment (PPE) and we continue to follow Public Health England guidelines on when staff should wear PPE to protect themselves and our residents.”

In August, following a Freedom of Information request battle from the Local Democracy Reporting Service, it was found that nearly 380 patients from Derby and Burton’s hospitals and more than 80 from Chesterfield Royal, were discharged to care homes without being tested.

These patients were sent to care homes between March 1 and April 15, a period within which wholesale Covid testing was not mandatory under government guidance.

On April 16, government policy changed to test all hospital patients being discharged to care homes.

By that point, Covid outbreaks had already begun – with 34 Covid-19 related deaths in Derby and Derbyshire care homes in the week ending April 17.

The delay in symptoms surfacing in residents – often taking up to two weeks – became apparent in the weeks that followed.

By May 15, there had been 211 Covid deaths in Derby and Derbyshire care homes – public and private.

On June 18, Derbyshire County Council revealed that during the pandemic 129 of its care home residents and 34 staff had tested positive for the virus.

At that point, 18 of its care home residents had died after contracting the virus.

Weekly care home staff testing only became national policy at the start of June.

The authority runs 23 care homes and has 969 staff.

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