Government has delayed order of South Korean kits as they have not been tested, it is claimed

The government risks losing an offer from South Korea of 400,000 coronavirus test kits a week to a rival country because they have not yet been tested by Public Health England, it has been claimed.

A shareholder in the South Korean LG conglomerate has sourced the kits from five companies in the country and has offered them to the UK through a contact who was the former deputy leader of the Conservative party in Westminster council.

Nick Markham says he has been in touch with the government, but they are dragging their heels and insisting they won’t make a decision until the kits are tested.

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He says the production facilities and kits already manufactured are in huge demand, and countries including Ukraine and Romania have already sent military planes out to snap up the supplies.

“It is like the wild west out there. Even Morocco has sent a plane but we can’t get the government to make a commitment. The key thing is put an option on the production or we’re going to lose it,” he said.

Markham said he had been in touch with the health secretary, Matt Hancock, who passed the offer on to Lord Bethall, a junior minister who is heading up the procurement effort.

“I get that they want to test the kit, but everyone is hiding behind this ‘we can’t decide until it’s tested’, which is perfectly reasonable, but we will get gazumped,” said Markham.

He said JP Lee, the shareholder in LG Chemicals, was “an Anglophile” after spending time at the London School of Economics and wanted to help the UK.

“He told me that he doesn’t understand why Britain isn’t out here, that the rest of the world is,” said Markham.

Seoul’s fight against coronavirus has been lauded as one of the world’s most successful and more than 120 countries have sought its advice.

It took an aggressive approach to testing, and manufacturing of diagnostic kits has been increased to hundreds of thousands a day after approval was granted to export to the US. NHS Scotland has already decided to receive some equipment from South Korea.

Markham is the chair of London and Continental Railways, a property company owned by the government, but was previously a TV executive and part of the team that merged Granada and Carlton TV and launched Freeview.

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He said he took on this role voluntarily because of his contacts in government and says he is “sympathetic” to the Department of Health, which has been overwhelmed with offers of help.

The kits could be available by the end of next week with production capacity rising to a million kits a week.

The 400,000 kits would cost $10m (£8.1m) but all JP Lee needs is for the government to take out an option on the supply.

“Then if the kits didn’t pass the PHE test, which they will, or if the government says it has already secured enough testing kits, then nothing comes of it, it’s a win-win situation,” he said.

Hancock announced two days ago that his goal was to increase the number of tests for NHS health workers to 100,000 a day by the end of April, but scientists said on Friday they were struggling to get the kits.

If the government already has the volume it needs, Markham will stand this effort down, but he is concerned that this is not the case and Britain could be losing a valuable opportunity in the fight against coronavirus.

Markham has teamed up with entrepreneur Steve Whatley, founder of the Inchora investment company that focuses on under-served communities, to develop what he called a “Operation Little Boat” drive to get hundreds of testing centres open by using volunteer staff not in the NHS with some clinical experience, such as dentists and optometrists.

Last week Sir Paul Nurse, the chair of the Francis Crick Institute, said a “Dunkirk spirit” approach was needed to meet the testing challenge.

The Department for Health has been approached for comment.