Recommendation 173

The consequences of this initial failure were profound. Testing not only allowed individuals to be identified who had covid-19—and were infectious—but test results for an invisible virus were the only way to be able to accurately monitor the incidence and spread of the virus across the country, and to understand which groups it affected most and which it affected least.258 The UK was reduced to understanding the spread of covid-19 by waiting for people to be so sick that they needed to be admitted to hospital.