The rules for Covid-19 testing are set to change imminently with people who are positive on a lateral flow test no longer needing a follow-up PCR, it is understood.

The relaxation of the measure will reportedly be announced by the Government today as a way of helping cut isolation periods and prevent staff shortages.

Currently, people who test positive on a lateral flow are required to confirm their results with a follow-up gold-standard PCR check.

But the rule change will mean people who receive a positive lateral flow result will instead only have to isolate from a week starting from the date they test positive – provided they are testing negative on days six and seven.

This is because currently if people are asymptomatic, they have to start their isolation period from when they test positive on a PCR – which currently may take days to come back.

This means asymptomatic sufferers – believed to be some 40% of cases – will be able to return to work faster.

More than 1 million people are currently self-isolating due to coronavirus in the UK, causing mass staff shortages in schools, on trains and worryingly in the NHS.

The chief executive of the NHS Confederation said there are ‘unprecedented’ health worker shortages, while staff still able to come in are ‘exhausted’ after giving up their days off.

At least eight NHS trusts have announced critical incidents in the past few days and are bracing for a ‘tsunami’ of Omicron cases.

Health leaders have warned the NHS is ‘in a state of crisis’ and a leaked note from the North East Ambulance service said emergency call handlers were recommending heart attack victims get a lift via family or a taxi to A&E.

Despite admitting the NHS is on a ‘war footing’ in a Downing Street press conference yesterday, Boris Johnson resisted calls to introduce further pandemic measures.

Instead he announced the continuation of Plan B measures like mask wearing and working from home, and offered critical workers daily tests as part of efforts to ‘ride out’ the Omicron variant.

It comes as the UK reported a record number of new cases on Tuesday, with nearly 220,000 confirmed infections.

Mr Johnson accepted the weeks ahead are going to be ‘challenging’ and said ‘some services will be disrupted by staff absences’ as he pledged to ‘fortify’ the NHS to help relieve the pressure.

He added: ‘I would say we have a good chance of getting through the Omicron wave without the need for further restrictions and without the need certainly for a lockdown.’

But last week Paul Hunter, a professor in medicine at the University of East Anglia, warned ‘the pain of self-isolation’ could be causing more issues for the public and healthcare workers than the illness itself.

Asked on BBC Breakfast about NHS staff shortages due to workers having to isolate, he said: ‘This is a disease that’s not going away, the infection is not going away, although we’re not going to see as severe disease for much longer.

‘Ultimately, we’re going to have to let people who are positive with Covid go about their normal lives as they would do with any other cold. And so, at some point, we’ve got to relax this.

‘If the self-isolation rules are what’s making the pain associated with Covid, then we need to do that perhaps sooner rather than later. Maybe not quite just yet.’

He added Covid-19 ‘will become effectively just another cause of the common cold’.

This is a breaking news story, more to follow soon… Check back shortly for further updates.

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