In an article written by UNN’s Jacqui Deevoy, published by Ickonic, it’s revealed that a 2020 NHs protocol, not only encouraged coercion and guilt-tripping when it came to getting hospital patients to undergo Covid testing, but it also instructed docs to put the refuseniks “should be placed last on the theatre list where possible”. Jacqui investigates whether this protocol still stands and asks why it was ever implemented in the first place.
The shocking discovery of NHS guidance, drawn up on July 20th 2020, came after a woman (the friend of a member of a support group I set up) was admitted to hospital with suspected appendicitis in March 2023.
She was told she’d have to have a PCR swab test. She said she didn’t want one.
Over a period of a few hours, she was asked four times to take the test: each time she politely declined.
NHS staff insinuated that they wouldn’t be able to treat her and said she couldn’t be moved to a ward to further diagnosis and treatment until she took the test. She refused again.
Despite her saying no to testing, she was
eventually put on a ward for diagnosis. Despite feeling unwell, she started researching what the actual rules are in situations such as this and that’s when she found the 2020 guidance from the Royal Devon University Hospital:
https://www.rdehospital.nhs.uk/media/1wkposi0/patients-who-decline-a-covid-19-diagnostic-test.pdf
The woman wasn’t a patient at that particular hospital but that’s the only guidance she should find online on the subject of how NHS staff should deal with hospital in-patients who choose to decline Covid tests.
In the ‘guidance’ section of the document, it clearly states that patients have the right to refuse the test but it then says “they should be reminded that testing is in the best interests of themselves, patients and staff. The psychological impact on staff should be explained, in addition to the risks and benefits.”
It goes on to say that a senior clinician may need to be informed of the patient’s refusal so their reasons for refusing can be further explored. The guidance advises staff to clearly document this information in the patient’s clinical notes.
Another alarming aspect to this protocol is that if a person cannot give their informed consent but is resisting a test, they should be sent for a mental capacity assessment. But if a person who appears to be lacking mental capacity agrees to the test, the advice is to proceed!
The most shocking line of all in the guidance though states: “Patients whose Covid-19 status is unknown who require surgery or procedures should be placed last on the theatre list where possible.”
The woman was concerned to read this and became worried that, should she need an appendectomy, she’d be placed last on the theatre list, potentially putting her life at risk.
Fortunately, after a scan, she was told she didn’t have appendicitis, that no surgery was required and, after 24 hours in the hospital, she was discharged.
After 24 hours in the hospital and after being diagnosed with appendicitis, the woman was sent home. She doesn’t think that being sent away was anything to do with her declining the test.
After hearing her story, I decided to find out more about guidance for Covid testing in hospitals.
Getting a response from NHS England and UKHSA wasn’t easy. After two days of being passed from one to another (and eight ‘out of office reply’ emails from press officers on holiday or paternity leave), Senior Communications Officer Rosie Wyves-Webb at NHS England came back with this:
“If you’re looking for information specifically around patients who decline a COVID test, I’m not sure we’d be the lead agency for this. NHS England published a standard operating procedure about testing before admission for elective surgery that states ‘NHS trusts will need to put in place alternative arrangements for patients who have difficulties with home testing or fail to test in advance of admission, including when a patient may need to attend for elective surgery at short notice, eg due to a cancellation’, but it would be for their press office to confirm if this SOP, and any other relevant ones, are still in place across their NHS Trusts.”
“Infection prevention and control is operationalised locally by trusts, so the below is one document from one trust back in 2020, so I don’t think you can reasonably say this is reflective of what all trusts are doing now. We wrote to trusts in August last year about the UKHSA guidance on testing C1662_covid-testing-in-periods-of-low-prevalence.pdf (england.nhs.uk) and in this letter we said: ‘NHS organisations are asked to review their COVID-19 testing protocols in light of this new guidance, and implement changes as required.’ So how this is done operationally is up to the trust so your query must go to the trust concerned in this particular case. decided to go directly to the hospital who’d originally published the guidance.”
I contacted the Royal Devon University Hospital communications department and, according to their Communications Officer Joseph Madge, on the subject of the 2020 guidance, “this is no longer in use and was removed from our intranets a while back.” I asked when but was told I’d need to put in an FOI request to get that information.
NHS England added, with regards to the 2020 guidance from the RDUH that “I don’t think you can reasonably say this is reflective of what all trusts are doing now. We wrote to trusts in August last year about the UKHSA guidance on testing C1662_covid-testing-in-periods-of-low-prevalence.pdf (england.nhs.uk) and in this letter we said: ‘NHS organisations are asked to review their COVID-19 testing protocols in light of this new guidance, and implement changes as required.’ So how this is done operationally is up to the trust so your query must go to the trust concerned in this particular case.”
The hospital, the UKHSA and NHS England were all keen to know what my article was about and where it was going to be published. I told them the truth – that it was about guidance on testing and that it hadn’t been pitched yet.
A spokesperson (there was no name on this particular email) for NHS England also said: “Anyone can refuse a test as they aren’t mandated. If we think the patient might have Covid, then we would treat them, again in line with UKHSA guidance, re PPE/infection prevention and control measures. This is also outlined in the document you shared, but we can’t make people take a test.”
So there we have it. Anyone can refuse a test but there’s no mention of how these refuseniks should be dealt with. Not in 2023 anyway. Whilst coercion and guilt-tripping seemed to be the directed modus operandi back in 2020, it looks like NHS England are saying that they’ve decided to pull back on that a bit.
All well and good but, after hearing the story from the woman with suspected appendicitis, it would seem that some hospitals haven’t got the memo.
Jacqui Deevoy has been a full time freelance journalist for more than three decades. Over the last few years, she’s lost faith in the MSM and now prefers to work for news outlets that deal in truth, not lies.
In 2021, she launched a personal investigation into euthanasia in the NHS and this resulted in her producing the shocking documentary ‘A Good Death?’ She is currently crowdfunding for a second film – ‘Playing God’ – due for release soon.
She produces and presents the UNN Friday night show – a sometimes serious but often irreverent chat-fest with an array of fascinating guests talking on a wide range of subjects. She’s also one of UNN’s lead reporters.
Follow Jacqui on Twitter @JacquiDeevoy1
