The Transport Secretary has announced that drones will be trialled to deliver medical supplies.
Speaking at the daily Downing Street Coronavirus press conference on Friday, Grant Shapps said that he had ‘fast-tracked’ the trials for deliveries by drone, with the first trials to begin next week to carry supplies to St Mary’s hospital on the Isle of Wight.
The trials are part of wider plans which have seen thousands of volunteers and vehicles put on standby to help frontline responders as part of a new Transport Support Unit.
At the press conference, questions were asked over the availability of COVID-19 tests for key workers. On Thursday, Health Secretary Matt Hancock announced that key workers and their households would now be able to access tests for the Coronavirus following an expansion in testing capacity. However, the government website closed applications for tests shortly after opening them this morning.
Speaking on Friday, Mr Shapps said the website had not crashed and that it was the case “simply that the slots for today were taken up”. It is understood more slots will be available from Saturday.
According to the latest figures, more than 143,000 people in the United Kingdom have tested positive for COVID-19 and over 19,500 over those who tested positive have since died in UK hospitals.
