Full, accurate and complete disclosure of SARS-COV-2 virus records

Department of Health and Social Care did not have the information requested.

Dear Department of Health and Social Care,

Please provide a full, accurate and complete list of records held within your office, and or under your authority, describing the isolation of a SARS-COV-2 virus, directly taken from a symptomatic patient of COVID-19 where the sample was not first combined with any other source of genetic material (not limited but by way of example monkey kidney cells, aka vero cells, liver cancer cells) thereby eliminating contamination as a possible alternative source of sampling.
Please note isolation is used in the normally understood meaning of the word – the act of separating a thing from another. I am not referring, and hence not requesting, to isolation meaning the culture of something else, the performance of an amplification test (eg PCR test which only detect mRNA or DNA) or the sequencing of “something”.
If any records match the above description and are available to the public elsewhere, please provide enough information so that I may identify and access each record with certainty (i.e. title, author(s), date, journal, and weblink or location where the public may access it).
I remind you full, accurate and complete disclosure is required.

Yours faithfully,

Marc Horn

Department of Health and Social Care

This is an acknowledgement - please do not reply to this email.

Thank you for contacting the Department of Health and Social Care. 

We are currently experiencing high volumes of enquiries and we are
focusing our resources on the Coronavirus (COVID-19) response.

The answers to many questions, including the latest information on
COVID-19, can be found on [1]GOV.UK, the [2]Department of Health and
Social Care website or by visiting the [3]NHS website. We may not respond
to you if the answer to your enquiry can be found on either of these
websites. Where a reply is appropriate, we aim to send a response within
18 working days, or 20 working days if your query is a Freedom of
Information request or complaint.

If you are experiencing symptoms related to COVID-19, please
visit [4]111.nhs.uk or telephone your GP surgery immediately for further
advice. Do not go to a GP surgery, pharmacy or hospital directly.

If your organisation can offer support to help with the response to
coronavirus, including the supply of personal protective equipment, the
Government has set up an [5]online hub to compile and respond to all
offers. 

If you are clinician looking to support the NHS, please visit the [6]NHS
Professionals website for further information. 

If you are a clinician who has retired within the last 6 years and would
like more information on how to apply for the temporary register, please
visit the [7]NHS England website for further information. 

If you are a student looking to join the NHS, please visit the HEE website
for detailed guidance for [8]nurses and [9]doctors respectively. 

If you are seeking to offer your time to/volunteer for the NHS, please
visit [10]this website for more information.

The Department of Health and Social Care does not process complaints about
the NHS or social services. If you wish to make a complaint about a
healthcare professional, an NHS organisation or a social care provider,
please visit the [11]Complaints Procedure page on GOV.UK.

You can find out more about the Department’s commitments from our Personal
Information
Charterhttps://www.gov.uk/government/organisati....

This e-mail and any attachments is intended only for the attention of the
addressee(s). Its unauthorised use, disclosure, storage or copying is not
permitted. If you are not the intended recipient, please destroy all
copies and inform the sender by return e-mail. Any views expressed in this
message are not necessarily those of the Department of Health and Social
Care. Please note: Incoming and outgoing email messages are routinely
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communications.

References

Visible links
1. https://www.gov.uk/
2. https://www.gov.uk/government/organisati...
3. https://www.nhs.uk/
4. https://111.nhs.uk/covid-19/
5. https://www.gov.uk/coronavirus-support-f...
6. https://www.nhsprofessionals.nhs.uk/
7. http://www.england.nhs.uk/coronavirus/re...
8. https://www.hee.nhs.uk/news-blogs-events...
9. https://www.hee.nhs.uk/news-blogs-events...
10. https://www.goodsamapp.org/nhs/
11. https://www.gov.uk/government/organisati...

Dear Department of Health and Social Care,

You are in breach of your legal duties and obligations of providing the required information by the 21 August 2020 to allow full accountability of your actions to the public.

Please immediately correct your breach within the next 3 working days.

Yours faithfully,

Marc Horn

Department of Health and Social Care

1 Attachment

Dear Mr Horn,

Please find attached the Department of Health and Social Care's response
to your recent FOI request (our ref: FOI-1243364 ) (Today being the 20th
working day)

Yours sincerely,

 Dorothy Crowe 

Freedom of Information team
Department of Health and Social Care

show quoted sections

Dear Department of Health and Social Care,

Please pass this on to the person who conducts Freedom of Information reviews.

I am writing to request an internal review of Department of Health and Social Care's handling of my FOI request 'Full, accurate and complete disclosure of SARS-COV-2 virus records'.

Based upon your previous responses to my FOI:
"...it has long been known that viral diseases cannot be identified in this way as viruses cannot be grown in ‘pure culture’.
When a patient is tested for a viral illness, this is normally done by looking for the presence of antigens, or viral genetic code in a host with molecular biology techniques"

Accordingly please provide a full, accurate and complete list of records held within your office, and / or under your authority, supporting the following claims;

1 - Which symptoms uniquely identify COVID-19?
2 - Which viral antigens uniquely identify COVID-19?
3 - Which viral genetic code uniquely identifies SARS-Cov-2?
4 - What is the accuracy of the testing method for unique COVID-19 antigens upon which those governing rely upon, with supporting scientific verification?
5 - What is the accuracy of the testing method for unique SARS-Cov-2 genetic code upon which those governing rely upon, with supporting scientific verification?
6 - https://www.gov.uk/guidance/high-consequ...
shows updates detailing the explanation of the removal of COVID-19 from the HCID list was on the version dated 21 March 2019. However there is no link to the source document.
Please provide source document from "the 4 nations public health HCID group..." that supported the decision that " As of 19 March 2020, COVID-19 is no longer considered to be a high consequence infectious disease (HCID) in the UK.".

There is plenty of assumptions and presumptions, however there is no definitive evidence requested in my FOI request. In order to make legislation presumptions and assumptions is a breach of duty of care, and can even be gross negligence. Legislature relies upon expert opinion, and must be able to show proportionality and for the common good, failing which the legislation is null and void being against logic and reason. Accordingly you are required to provide the records upon which PHE relies upon to show it has followed its lawful obligations, and that means you are required to show evidence not based upon the opinions of others assumptions and presumptions resulting from your response to my original FOI.

A full history of my FOI request and all correspondence is available on the Internet at this address: https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/f...

Yours faithfully,

Marc Horn

Department of Health and Social Care

This is an acknowledgement - please do not reply to this email.

Thank you for contacting the Department of Health and Social Care. 

We are currently experiencing high volumes of enquiries and we are
focusing our resources on the Coronavirus (COVID-19) response.

The answers to many questions, including the latest information on
COVID-19, can be found on [1]GOV.UK, the [2]Department of Health and
Social Care website or by visiting the [3]NHS website. We may not respond
to you if the answer to your enquiry can be found on either of these
websites. Where a reply is appropriate, we aim to send a response within
18 working days, or 20 working days if your query is a Freedom of
Information request or complaint.

If you are experiencing symptoms related to COVID-19, please
visit [4]111.nhs.uk or telephone your GP surgery immediately for further
advice. Do not go to a GP surgery, pharmacy or hospital directly.

If your organisation can offer support to help with the response to
coronavirus, including the supply of personal protective equipment, the
Government has set up an [5]online hub to compile and respond to all
offers. 

If you are clinician looking to support the NHS, please visit the [6]NHS
Professionals website for further information. 

If you are a clinician who has retired within the last 6 years and would
like more information on how to apply for the temporary register, please
visit the [7]NHS England website for further information. 

If you are a student looking to join the NHS, please visit the HEE website
for detailed guidance for [8]nurses and [9]doctors respectively. 

If you are seeking to offer your time to/volunteer for the NHS, please
visit [10]this website for more information.

The Department of Health and Social Care does not process complaints about
the NHS or social services. If you wish to make a complaint about a
healthcare professional, an NHS organisation or a social care provider,
please visit the [11]Complaints Procedure page on GOV.UK.

You can find out more about the Department’s commitments from our Personal
Information
Charterhttps://www.gov.uk/government/organisati....

This e-mail and any attachments is intended only for the attention of the
addressee(s). Its unauthorised use, disclosure, storage or copying is not
permitted. If you are not the intended recipient, please destroy all
copies and inform the sender by return e-mail. Any views expressed in this
message are not necessarily those of the Department of Health and Social
Care. Please note: Incoming and outgoing email messages are routinely
monitored for compliance with our policy on the use of electronic
communications.

References

Visible links
1. https://www.gov.uk/
2. https://www.gov.uk/government/organisati...
3. https://www.nhs.uk/
4. https://111.nhs.uk/covid-19/
5. https://www.gov.uk/coronavirus-support-f...
6. https://www.nhsprofessionals.nhs.uk/
7. http://www.england.nhs.uk/coronavirus/re...
8. https://www.hee.nhs.uk/news-blogs-events...
9. https://www.hee.nhs.uk/news-blogs-events...
10. https://www.goodsamapp.org/nhs/
11. https://www.gov.uk/government/organisati...

Dear Department of Health and Social Care,

You are in breach of your legal duties and obligations of providing the required information by the 14 September 2020 to allow full accountability of your actions to the public.

Please immediately correct your breach within the next 3 working days.

Yours faithfully,

Marc Horn

FreedomofInformation, Department of Health and Social Care

2 Attachments

Dear Mr Horm,

 

I apologise for the length of time it has taken to carry out your
requested internal review of FOI-1243364.

 

The review is now complete. Please see the attached letter for the
outcome.

 

 

Yours sincerely,

 

Charlene Carter

 

Charlene Carter

Freedom of Information Casework Manager

Department of Health and Social Care

39 Victoria Street, London SW1H 0EU

 

 

This e-mail and any attachments is intended only for the attention of the
addressee(s). Its unauthorised use, disclosure, storage or copying is not
permitted. If you are not the intended recipient, please destroy all
copies and inform the sender by return e-mail. Any views expressed in this
message are not necessarily those of the Department of Health and Social
Care. Please note: Incoming and outgoing email messages are routinely
monitored for compliance with our policy on the use of electronic
communications.

Janey Circumference left an annotation ()

I think this is what you're looking for, I think this was the first ...
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/article...
And I think this was the first European isolation ..
https://www.eurosurveillance.org/content...