A MASS testing programme aiming to test thousands of Teessiders every week could allow visits to loved ones in care homes, according to a health chief.

Large batches of lateral flow tests which can offer results in 20 to 30 minutes are being sent to teams in Middlesbrough, Stockton and Redcar and Cleveland this week.

The programme is promising to test 10 per cent of the population of each borough every week in a bid to try and clamp down on transmission.

South Tees public health chief Mark Adams told councillors the new mass testing programme would be targeting vulnerable people “as much as possible” at a meeting on Tuesday.

He revealed there were plans in place to offer the quick turnaround tests to designated care home visitors to allow them to see their loved ones.

“So a resident would have a regular member of the family who would get tested on a regular basis,” said Mr Adams.

The health chief said staff who visited vulnerable people outside care homes were also being lined up as priorities for the new tests.

Meanwhile, the third strand of the strategy would use the new lateral flow devices to test care home staff more regularly.

The idea is this would offer a faster turnaround of results to protect residents.

Care home fatalities made up a high proportion of covid deaths during the first wave of the pandemic on Teesside.

Figures from the Office of National Statistics (ONS) showed there were 39 deaths involving covid-19 reported in Middlesbrough, Redcar and Cleveland and Stockton care homes between October 1 and November 6.

Mr Adams said the mass testing plan was being drawn up across the North-East given care home groups often operated in more than one borough.

“We haven’t worked through the number of tests we’re anticipating to get,” he added. “We think it’s a weekly amount of 10 per cent of the population.

“Other than looking at the immediate question of “where on Earth do we store all these tests?”, it’s a significant number we can use to better understand what’s happening in our local communities.

“We will target them at vulnerable people as we outlined in our outbreak management plan published in June.”

Meanwhile, the health chief revealed the public health team was working to increase capacity in its own contact tracing system with better knowledge of what’s going on Teesside.

And he added there were also separate moves to create a regional test, trace and isolate programme in the North-East given some of the shortcomings and delays in the national system.

Mr Adams said: “We’re working led by Eugene Milne, the director of public health in Newcastle, to pull some resources from the national system to redevelop a local model to remove the inconsistencies and problems."

“The national system didn’t even pick up the hundreds of people who tested positive at Newcastle University – so their situational awareness is very poor as well.”

NHS dashboard data showed Middlesbrough had a rolling seven day covid rate of 388.7 per 100,000 for the seven day period between November 1 and November 7.

But using data at his disposal, Mr Adams told councillors the rate now stood at around 410 cases per 100,000 people in the town – the highest level since the second wave began.

When it came to hopes for a new vaccine, the health chief said it would be organised across a North-East footprint.

But he added it was “more likely to be Easter than Christmas” when it was rolled out.

Mr Adams said: “We need to develop our plans presuming that sort of timescale, rather than thinking there is a solution around the corner.

“And we need to work on plans to protect our communities, rather than thinking the vaccine is going to be here in the next couple of weeks.”