Residents of the city of Liverpool in the UK will be offered repeated testing for SARS-CoV-2 as part of a pilot program, Sky News reports.
According to the Liverpool city council, the city is at very high alert under the UK's three-tier system for COVID-19. Liverpool, Sky News notes, has one of the highest rates of COVID-19 in the UK, with 366.4 cases per 100,000 people. Liverpool has a population of about 500,000.
Under this new pilot program, residents of Liverpool will be offered repeat testing beginning Friday using a combination of existing swab tests and new, rapid lateral flow tests, Sky News adds. According to the Guardian, LAMP tests will be used to test National Health Service staff, and that NHS staff will be conducting testing with logistical help from the army.
"These tests will help identify the many thousands of people in the city who don't have symptoms, but can still infect others without knowing," Prime Minister Boris Johnson says, according to Sky News.
If the pilot goes well, Johnson adds that mass testing could be rolled out in other COVID-19 hotspots in the UK, Sky News says.