Plans to introduce coronavirus tracing have been hit by fresh uncertainty as it emerged that a mobile tracking app will not be ready until June.
Matt Hancock, the health secretary, said last week that the app would be “rolling out in mid May” across England, but on Tuesday ministerial sources tried to downplay a system considered critical to control the disease as the country emerges from lockdown.
It came as the deputy chief scientific adviser acknowledged the decision to abandon track-and-trace in March was made because of a lack of testing capacity, but said it was “the right thing to do” in the circumstances.
Prof Angela McLean told the No 10 press briefing: “The advice that we gave certainly took account of what testing was available. It was what was the best thing to do with the tests that we had. We could not have people in hospital with Covid symptoms not knowing whether or not they had Covid.”
Answering another question, she added: “At the time, with the testing we had, the right thing to do was focus it on people who were really sick in hospital, so we knew who in hospital had Covid.”
George Eustice, the environment secretary, appeared to back up her view, saying: “It’s undoubtedly the case that early on we were wanting to build that capacity.”
NHS insiders said the deployment of the tracking app currently being trialled on the Isle of Wight would not take place until next month as developers iron out problems. “This is a complicated thing to do and get right,” one source said.
It is the latest in a string of slippages that have followed Hancock’s declaration. By the end of last week, the launch date moved back to the end of the month, and on Monday Downing Street said it would be ready “in a few weeks”.
Efforts have been further complicated by the government’s insistence on deploying a centralised tracing database, which records a user’s contacts and the first half of their postcode if they declare they are ill.
The NHS says it wants to be able to monitor for regional outbreaks, but that approach is not favoured by tech giants Apple and Google – who say contact data should be retained only by a person on their phone.
That has forced the NHS development team to develop a string of “workarounds” to try to make the system run smoothly. A particular concern has been to ensure that the phone remains on – so the app can track connections – whilst not draining the battery.
Signs of the growing difficulties were acknowledged by Thérèse Coffey, the work and pensions secretary on Tuesday morning. She conceded that children may start returning to primary school on 1 June before the app was ready. “I’m not aware that’s been set as a condition that’s necessary for the phased reopening of primary schools,” she said.
A government source added that the app should be seen as “a support: a digital supplement” to human contact-tracing – and downplayed the significance of the new technology, insisting: “There’s been a bit too much focus on the app.”
Privacy watchdogs also warned on Tuesday that the tracing app could hand a huge amount of personal information to the government.
Martha Spurrier, the director of Liberty, said: “Given the government’s record of sharing health, education and police records with immigration enforcement, it’s alarming that it has chosen an app design that prioritises data collection – including data not needed for contact-tracing – over privacy.”
Labour MP Harriet Harman, the chair of parliament’s joint committee on human rights, called for MPs to be allowed to vote on preventing government from using the data collected for other purposes – although Hancock has insisted fresh legislation is not required to get started.