Test and Trace chief Dido Harding prompted to self-isolate by NHS COVID-19 app
- Reference: 1605701506
- News link: https://www.theregister.co.uk/2020/11/18/test_and_trace_chief_dido_harding_self_isolating/
- Source link:
In a tweet this morning, Harding said she was feeling well, and that there's "nothing like personal experience of your own products." A screenshot posted to Twitter shows Harding with nine days remaining in her isolation period.
Nothing like personal experience of your own products ....got this overnight. Feeling well. Many hours of Zoom ahead. [1]pic.twitter.com/Ims9W9gbQh — dido harding (@didoharding) [2]November 18, 2020
The NHS mandates that anyone with symptoms or a confirmed diagnosis should quarantine for 10 days. If someone has merely been exposed to the disease, that isolation period is increased to 14 days as it takes some time for symptoms to emerge.
Speaking to The Register , a Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) spokesperson said: "Dido Harding is self-isolating after being anonymously notified to do so by the NHS COVID-19 app.
"The NHS Test and Trace system continues to break chains of transmission, with everybody having their part to play in tackling this virus."
The DHSC declined to say who would take over should Harding become too unwell to perform her duties, but pointed us to comments where she forecast "many hours of Zoom ahead."
Harding, who previously served as chief executive of the TalkTalk Group, was appointed by Health Secretary Matt Hancock to lead NHS Test and Trace in May.
Her tenure has been overshadowed by multiple failures and delays to roll out a functional contact-tracing app. The first iteration intended to use a centralised approach, which raised questions about privacy, particularly pertaining to whether individual users could be identified, and [3]how long any collected data would be retained.
Although this effort saw a brief trial on the Isle of Wight, it simply wasn't ready for a UK-wide deployment, and was [4]subsequently discontinued in favour of a brand new implementation in late September based on the privacy-protecting APIs established by Google and Apple.
UK privacy watchdog confirms probe into NHS England COVID-19 app after complaints of spammy emails, texts [5]READ MORE
El Reg pointed out the [6]technical deficiencies early on.
This latest app, NHS COVID-19, has been more successful, although not without its faults. In its haste to produce a working app for England and Wales, important functionality was left missing, including the ability for those on low incomes to [7]claim a self-isolation grant . Furthermore, upon release, it lacked compatibility with other contact-tracing applications used in other UK home nations and territories. That issue was resolved in early November. ®
Get our [8]Tech Resources
[1] https://t.co/Ims9W9gbQh
[2] https://twitter.com/didoharding/status/1328988118708523008?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw
[3] https://www.theregister.com/2020/05/04/uk_covid_app_human_rights_parliament/
[4] https://www.theregister.com/2020/06/19/uk_looks_to_apple_and/
[5] https://www.theregister.com/2020/10/01/ico_complaints_covid_app_spam/
[6] https://www.theregister.com/2020/05/05/uk_coronavirus_app/
[7] https://www.theregister.com/2020/10/23/nhs_covid19_contact_tracing_app/
[8] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/
Re: Nothing like personal experience of your own products
"Now publish all your personal data online so that you can experience what it is like to be a TalkTalk customer."
I was very tempted to Tweet that in response to her Tweet around 08:30 today. However I decided to stand back and avoid getting crushed in the stampede. Although AFAICS you're the only other person with a mind running on the same wonky rails as mine.
I have my doubts about the anonymity
Sure this is some dev's attempt to keep her out of the office!
Only advisory
Of course, the app is only advisory, unlike any call you get from an actual human successfully able to feign being from the government. But I guess she has no practical choice having staked recovering her reputation on this crock.
Re: Only advisory
In fact, in at least one workplace I know of, it is a formal disciplinary if you isolate when told to do so only by the app ... That includes if you are a teacher and an entire class has to isolate with multiple positive cases, the excuse being "our rules are that teachers social distance at all times" ... I still don't understand why cases are rising :-(
Re: Only advisory
But as we all know, advisory is the will of the people and must be implemented with no heed to how fucking shite it all is.
I may have gone off on a tangent.
Can she self isolate permanently?
"Can she self isolate permanently?"
In my darker moments I find myself wishing that she would isolate herself from oxygen. Is there anyone currently in government more incompetent? Other than Grayling, that is.
oh dear...
"Nothing like personal experience of your own products "
The implication being that's your first experience of it?
Way to go client-centred app design- that's nothing like it.
Suggestion...
If any NHS developers read this, can you increase her isolation period for a bit? Maybe change the datepart from days to decades perhaps?
---> because one day the pubs will be back
So she has been contaminated?
If I understand properly the rules, if she has to stay isolated for 9 days more it means that she has symptoms at a minimum.
And anybody in contact with her before should isolate also for 14 days?
Re: So she has been contaminated?
The 14 days starts from when you last had contact with the diseased humanoid, so the diseased gets their test back a couple of days later and then Dido gets her notification, thus time served is deducted from 14 days.
Incidentally, is there any punishment for feigning symptoms so you only need 10 days rather than 14 assuming you had more than 10 days left to sever?
Fun phone call
Hello boss? You can't come in to work today, you're sick.
Can Ms Dodo please be quarantined on another planet? She's there mentally but physical relocation would be nice. One way physical relocation, that is.
"Threatens plenty of Zoom sessions in the days ahead... just as well they've updated security in recent weeks"
Encryption would only be important if anything she said or did was of value.
A great pity...
That she, the rest of the crony businesses who have profiteered out of Covid 19, and the shambolic heap of dung that masquerades as the Government couldn't self isolate too.
In a black hole.
Plenty more dog food needed
Is it too much to hope that as soon as this period of self-isolation ends (both for her and the PM) that another contact leads to another self-isolation period?
It looks as if this would be the only thing to prompt the realisation that rather than blind self-isolation the better option would be to require the subject to get tested and then isolate or not based on the result.
The app is a presumptive test with a possibility* of giving a false positive. The correct response to a positive presumptive test is to follow up with a definitive test.
* Have they any estimate of the probability that? If so we should be told what it it. If not they should at least make an effort to find out.
Re: Plenty more dog food needed
Dido: "what do you mean! The probability was checked thoroughly and each time it confirmed we would be paid without delay. Anyone for caviar dears."
Cheap as chips this track and trace
Boris has received a txt to self isolate, "now so have I", says the waster Dido I-lost-all-talktalk-customer-data-to-hackers Harding.
"This track and trace I made is absolutely FAB".
Well peasants that cost us all £12Billion to txt two of the virus! Just for publicity....?
So on the 10th November, John Penrose MP, husband of Dido Harding was told to self-isolate. Yet Dido was only informed by her app 5 days after she was in contact with someone (14 days self isolation, 9 days left when notified). So presumably hubby wasn't the contact. Good illustration of how weak "her" system is, that she can wander around for 5 days as a potential "spreader".
So on the 10th November, John Penrose MP, husband of Dido Harding was told to self-isolate. Yet Dido was only informed by her app 5 days after she was in contact with someone (14 days self isolation, 9 days left when notified). So presumably hubby wasn't the contact. Good illustration of how weak "her" system is, that she can wander around for 5 days as a potential "spreader".
Penrose was told to isolate because he had been in contact with some who had had a postive test. Penrose himself has not had a positive test.
People who live with those who are self-isolating but who haven't had a positive test don't have to self-isolate. Therefore Dido didn't have to self-isolate just because her husband was.
She herself has subsequently come into contact with someone who has now had a positive test. So now she has to self-isolate.
Those are the rules, and I am sure that they were laid down by the Government's medical advisers, and not by her.
If every contact of someone self-isolating had to self-isolate, there would be no staff in hospitals or schools.
WHY
...do I find myself sympathising with the virus in this case?
Stuck with only Dido for company...
One wonders how much she's benefitted from this COVID business...
I mean there's also that hand soap business that her and that there Trevor Bayliss started. ;)
Nothing like personal experience of your own products
Now publish all your personal data online so that you can experience what it is like to be a TalkTalk customer.