The cost of developing the Contact Tracing App and how many people had been notified that they’d come into close contact with someone reporting symptoms has been confirmed via written questions in Parliament.
Lord Scriven (Liberal Democrat) had asked how much the Contact Tracing App had cost to develop.
The App was rolled out on the Isle of Wight in early May and ran for six weeks before being scrapped last month.
Development cost of £11m
Lord Bethell, The Parliamentary Under-Secretary for Health and Social Care, replied,
“To date the cost of developing the National Health Service Covid-19 App is £10.8 million.
“Our investment in the Isle of Wight phase has provided us with valuable information that we can combine with Google and Apple’s technology in a new solution to support the entire NHS Test and Trace service and product that is right for the British public
How many App users notified?
Another Lord to have his written question answered yesterday was Lord Mann.
He’d asked how many people had registered for App on the Isle of Wight and “how many individuals affected by Covid-19 have been traced to date using that App”.
Lord Bethell replied,
“Over 50,000 people on the Isle of Wight downloaded and activated the App.
“Out of this number, on 18th June, 1,765 people had been notified that they had been in close contact with someone who had symptoms.”
Unanswered questions
News OnTheWight is still waiting for answers to our eight simple questions, now asked over a month ago.
The Isle of Wight council, Public Health Isle of Wight, and the department for Health and Social Care have all managed to swerve (fail to) replying.
