Government comes under fire for lack of tracing

Today the Prime Minister has announced that there will be a "world-beating" coronavirus tracing system that will be capable of tracing "10,000 new cases a day", that will come into play as of the 1st of June.

After receiving comments that he had left a "huge hole" in UK coronavirus defences, the PM has reworked plans to use tracing in an attempt to help curb the detriment to the country which were originally abandoned on the 12th of March. Currently a trial is underway on the Isle of Wight, where over half of the population have downloaded the NHS app, but plans to roll the app out across the UK have been pushed back since the claim from the Health Secretary that it would be in England from "mid-march".

And so now, nine weeks after the UK was put into lockdown, the UK government sets forward its plan to deliver this "world-beating" tracing system. In order for such a system to achieve any level of success, around 70-80% of the public will need to download the centralised app system. However given that only 67% of the UK has downloaded WhatsApp, one of the most successful apps of all time (also note it is an encrypted app), it seems unlikely that enough will download an app, and so this will make for an interesting world beater.

In other news, the "Afghan Dreamers", the all-girl Afghan robotics team that rose to prominence during an international robotics competition in the US in 2017 have began creating ventilators for patients using car parts. Afghanistan has a reported capacity of 400 ventilators, and with a hefty market price of $30,000 - $50,000, is unlikely to be able to afford more, despite the population of 38.9 million. But the team - made up of girls aged between 14 & 17 - is planning provide ventilators for around $600 by the end of May.