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Getting "pinged" by the NHS Covid-19 Test and Trace app


capybara

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52 minutes ago, Shade said:

Off topic but did anyone else get pinged by the COVID app after last Sunday? I just have but no symptoms.

 

Not exactly the end of season you would have been hoping for.

I haven't been pinged, either. Maybe there are different 'check-ins' for different parts of the house? They surely can't ping the whole audience - or can they?

 

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56 minutes ago, Shade said:

Off topic but did anyone else get pinged by the COVID app after last Sunday? I just have but no symptoms.

 

Does it take a week for a ping to come through?  Could you have been pinged for a different contact?

 

Sorry you've been pinged Shade.

 

I don't fully understand how the app works but there was an expert on Breakfast News a week or so ago who explained that the app basically works off bluetooth.  So if you are near someone who tests positive who also has bluetooth switched on you will get pinged.  You will not normally get pinged for checking in to a venue.  I had always had a concern that if I bought takeaway cakes in my favourite cafe at 09:45 but then don't check in anywhere else I would be checked in till midnight.  Therefore if someone who tested positive at 7pm would I get pinged even though we had not coincided.  Apparently not.  A friend was recently pinged but, of course, the App does not tell you where the contact happened.  She had spent the previous couple of days out and about with her husband and they had both checked in to places.  She has no idea why she got pinged and he didn't.

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Thanks all - the app does tell you the site of the contact and date so ROH, 11 July. Not sure if the app can link to the e tickets at ROH so they may be able to identify a smaller area? Or Capybara there may be different codes for different areas within ROH. I checked in on ‘old’ Bow street entrance. 

 

To be honest I felt more at risk on the tube, especially with all the football fans crowded on the platforms and trains! It’s just a bit late as I have been out and about since Sunday but following the precautions.

 

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I thought the idea of any of these apps was to show that you had been within 2 metres of an infected person for over 15 or 20 minutes.  I am vague about the time and distance, as it is a year now since I looked at the details, and obviously all parties have to be on Bluetooth.  However, if people are being pinged while travelling in a car and stopping at traffic lights, then something has gone seriously wrong with the programme!

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  • alison changed the title to Getting "pinged" by the NHS Covid-19 Test and Trace app

They can change the settings of the app to make it slightly more or less sensitive but it’s somewhere around what you’ve quoted Fonty. 
as far as the app is concerned I believe it can send a message to say you should isolate because you’ve been in contact (set off by proximity with the bluetooth) and a more general message to warn you that you’ve been in the same area as someone and to be aware. I thought it was only the second that gave you the location but could be wrong. Potentially the positive case could have developed symptoms 48 hours after your contact and then taken a few days to get a test and get the results back hence the delays!

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54 minutes ago, Jane said:

https://faq.covid19.nhs.uk/article/KA-01317/en-us
 

As I read it app can inform you you’ve potentially been near someone with C19 (point 2) so you are aware and what to do or you definitely have (point 1) and need to isolate and will then get the isolation countdown. 

 

The links in the FAQs are not working for me.  Perhaps they are currently being updated!

 

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Apparently there can be a time problem with this App. 
Somebody phoned LBC to say his daughter got pinged and they eventually worked out it was at a restaurant she had been in with her mum for lunch for about an hour and a quarter but they discovered the App thought they’d been there for about six hours!! So they may well have not even been in the restaurant at the same time as whoever it was who had tested positive. 
Can you not be allowed to take a test if you get pinged especially when have no symptoms so that only if it’s positive you should have to isolate? But I suppose they just haven’t got the number of tests that would be required to cope with so many. 
There should be a way of being able to sign out of somewhere so it’s not pinging you unnecessarily. 


 

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3 hours ago, LinMM said:

Apparently there can be a time problem with this App. 
Somebody phoned LBC to say his daughter got pinged and they eventually worked out it was at a restaurant she had been in with her mum for lunch for about an hour and a quarter but they discovered the App thought they’d been there for about six hours!! So they may well have not even been in the restaurant at the same time as whoever it was who had tested positive. 
Can you not be allowed to take a test if you get pinged especially when have no symptoms so that only if it’s positive you should have to isolate? But I suppose they just haven’t got the number of tests that would be required to cope with so many. 
There should be a way of being able to sign out of somewhere so it’s not pinging you unnecessarily. 


 


if you’ve just been in the same venue you don’t have to self isolate the alert is 

“You recently visited a venue on the same day as others who have since tested positive for coronavirus (COVID-19).”

 

You’re only advised to self isolate by the app if the Bluetooth has been triggered by being in close contact with someone there. Perhaps people have assumed the advisory message above means that they have to self isolate? 

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I've taken this app off my phone, after I forgot to turn it off while I was working somewhere where my phone was in a locker all day. I got pinged 7 days later for a specific day, when I can track my movements precisely.  I know I was not near enough to anyone to have been infected (I take tests twice a week, and took two tests over the next 2 days when I got pinged). I was working somewhere for 4 hours, all socially distanced, all masked, walked there so  didn't take public transport, and was at home for the other 20 hours of that day. So - because the pinging by the app is not legally enforceable, it's advisory - I made a judgement about isolating - as the message only came through with 1 more day of isolation, I got rid of the app. I was working at home that day anyway, so was effectively self-isolating for that last day. But I wasn't contacted either in person by a contact tracer, and the app didn't ping me until 9 days into the 10 for isolation, I thought it was pretty useless. 

 

On newish phones, the Bluetooth connection is so strong that you can be over 100 metres away from someone and be pinged. If you are passed by a bus, with someone who later reports positive infection, you can be pinged. 

 

I'm law-abiding - I still wear a mask in public, I WFH, I socially distance. But given the level of cronyism and ineffective government action over the track & trace app and the the general "contracts for families & mates" of this government, I have removed the app, without too much of a guilty conscience.

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I’ve just been speaking to a work colleague who was pinged, duly isolated for ten days, went out after his isolation ended (but nowhere crowded, wore a mask, distanced etc.) and was immediately pinged again, so is back in another ten day isolation. That’s 21 days only one of which he could actually leave the house. He also tests twice a week. It’s no wonder businesses are struggling and some people are deleting the app. If you work somewhere that doesn’t pay you if you isolate, there is no way people can afford to be put into that kind of situation. I have my own app switched on but I can’t entirely blame those who no longer bother.

 

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I don’t blame anyone who switches it off at all ( I never downloaded it in the first place ...I’m assuming it’s the one run by Serco? That was enough for me) 
I don’t work and don’t have children or grand children ( unfortunately) so decided it wasn’t worth me getting it and when things opened up in May I sign in and out of everywhere I go and activities like swimming ( where there are still

no lockers or changing rooms open anyway) are all pre booked so they have a list of everyone at any particular session and the same with studio Ballet class so all

participants can be easily traced if need be.

Im just about to do a two hour ballet Rep

session at the City Lit and if you don’t have that App or their App you sign in on the computer as you go in and anyway the teacher has a list of all attendees. 
The App is too vague to be fit for purpose as it is at present. 
Im hardly likely to catch Covid from somebody sitting three seats away on a bus or train and we are both masked and never even spoken to each other but could possibly from someone in a class I attend where it would be covered without the App.
Just because you don’t have the App does

not mean you are not acting responsibly. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Thanks for those reassurances. I did have a bit of residual bad conscience about deleting it, but going through exactly where I was on the day that supposedly I was close enough to someone to be infected, I knew it actually wasn't possible. Live alone, walked - was at a workplace which was almost empty and certainly socially distanced! 

 

And, @LinMM - yes, Serco. They have such a good record for managing data safely (not).

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There's a detailed explanation of how the app and risk scoring works here: https://covid19.nhs.uk/risk-scoring-algorithm.html

 

The key part seems to be "For the purposes of contact tracing, a high-risk encounter is classed as one where an individual has been within 2 metres of someone who has tested positive for Coronavirus for at least 15 minutes."

 

The Bluetooth signal strength of the other device tells it the proximity.

 

However, that's the theory - given the 'pingdemic', whether it's working as advertised in practice seems to be questionable...

 

 

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I think the problem is just the explosion in cases and relaxation of restrictions at the same time- it was always going to cause high numbers to have to isolate. Personal opinion, it would have made more sense to reduce interval between vaccinations, got the majority vaccinated and then got rid of restrictions and isolation for all fully vaccinated at the same time. 

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3 hours ago, Peony said:

would have made more sense to reduce interval between vaccinations

I agree, but there seems no consistent policy on that either. My son is trying to get a second jab 4-5 weeks after the first to simplify a trip.  He can't book an appointment online at less than 8 weeks after the first jab, and walk-ins seem to depend entirely on the GP on duty - so far he's found two that would have done it but had the wrong type of vaccine, and two who said they would only do it after 8 weeks... Hoping it's fifth time lucky tomorrow.

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yes officially it’s 8 weeks and that is what is on the protocol so staff have to stick to that. Unless there’s a prescriber at the session who can prescribe it according to their own recommendation. Most staff at the vacc centres have to work to the protocol regardless on what seems the most sensible option!

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This vaccination was originally recommended to be given 4-6 weeks apart but for expediency purposes in the first instance was extended to 12 weeks ....in actual practice this was found to be too long a gap between doses ......and now for other expediency purposes has been reduced to 8 weeks... which is probably better but in my view it seems things are organised around supply and demand etc rather than purely Health issues. 
Other countries are now catching us up in number of double vaccinated people who have not had this 12 week gap in the first place. 

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I’m glad he managed to get his second dose in the end!! 
It seems a shame not to allow some to have a lesser gap between doses when you hear some places are returning vaccines because not enough take up in those areas.  
I suppose it is all a bit complex though to anticipate how it will go now throughout the country. 

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I was just looking at the Theatre Royal Brighton's website as the new Matthew Bourne ballet will be on there, and they are insisting on Covid Vaccination Passes for over 18's before entrance to a performance! In fact there are vast amounts of information as how to acquire one from the NHS (I already have a printed letter version in case this becomes a problem). This is the first time I've seen this, just the start of things to come.

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This is what we had to get access to Wimbledon (and probably the Euros final, too, I'd guess, since both were "test events").  Be warned that if you print (or even if you don't) print the pass, it just comes out with a QR code (huge!), your name and the date until which the pass is valid for.  Lateral flow tests are 48 hours, vaccination status is allegedly 30 days, but mine came out with only 2 days' validity for some reason!  Either way, you don't want to download/print it off any earlier than you absolutely have to.

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2 hours ago, alison said:

This is what we had to get access to Wimbledon (and probably the Euros final, too, I'd guess, since both were "test events").  Be warned that if you print (or even if you don't) print the pass, it just comes out with a QR code (huge!), your name and the date until which the pass is valid for.  Lateral flow tests are 48 hours, vaccination status is allegedly 30 days, but mine came out with only 2 days' validity for some reason!  Either way, you don't want to download/print it off any earlier than you absolutely have to.

 

I got one, just to see what it looked like and it was valid for 30 days.  Presumably one can reapply as necessary?

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2 hours ago, Beryl H said:

I was under the impression when I applied, and there is nothing to show otherwise on the letter which was issued on 12th July, that there is no expiry date, it just gives details of what to do if I lose it. 

 

I've just checked the PDF I was sent a link to.  There is one of those square bar-code-thing at the top of it and underneath my name and DOB it says that the 2D bar-code expires on 1st August 2021.  I had applied on 2nd July.

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That's what it's supposed to say, assuming it's for vaccination.  I blithely printed mine off 2 days before Wimbledon, and was astonished to see that if I'd wanted to go in beyond about 11 pm I'd have needed to get a new copy.  Some sort of glitch, I hope.

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Well if theatres are requiring vaccine passports then they must want tests as well ....only because having had the vaccine doesn’t mean you cannot catch Covid. 

So not sure why they need the vaccination certification as well ... as a negative test should be sufficient in the end. 
I hope there’s a way of recording a negative test result without having to have the NHS App! 
 

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