Download app and play your part in fight against Covid-19

The new NHS Covid-19 App has been launched today (Thursday 24 September) and residents and businesses are urged to play their part by helping it become a vital tool in the fight against coronavirus.

Residents with smartphones are encouraged to download the app from the AppStore or Google Play, while a wide range of businesses and community venues must, by law, create and display Covid-19 App posters at their venues.

The posters feature a QR code which customers and visitors should scan using the app to safely and securely 'check in' on arrival. Customers will receive an alert if they have recently visited a venue and may have come into contact with someone with coronavirus.

The app also allows people to report symptoms, book a coronavirus test and keep track of when any period of self-isolation is due to end.

Councillor Jasbir Jaspal, the City of Wolverhampton Council's Cabinet Member for Public Health and Wellbeing, said: "Every person who downloads the NHS Covid-19 App will be doing their bit in the fight against coronavirus. The more people who use the app, the better it will work – helping us get ahead of the virus, preventing further deaths, local lockdowns and disruption to the economy.

"I would encourage everyone with a smartphone to download the app – and ask businesses and community venues to ensure they are displaying their posters in a prominent location so that customers can check in when they arrive on the premises."

Posters must be displayed by law by all restaurants, including restaurants and dining rooms in hotels or members’ clubs; cafes, including workplace canteens; bars, including bars in hotels or members’ clubs; and in pubs.

The following must also display the poster: amusement arcades; art fairs; betting and bingo halls; casinos; clubs providing team sporting activities; facilities for use by elite and professional sportspeople (including sports stadia); heritage locations and attractions open to the public (including castles, stately homes and other historic houses); hotels and other guest accommodation, including bed and breakfast, boats, campsites, caravans, chalets guest houses, holiday parks, hostels, motels, sleeper trains and yurts; indoor sport and leisure centres; outdoor swimming pools and lidos; museums and galleries; music recording studios and public libraries.

Close contact services including barbers, beauticians, dress fitters, tailors and fashion designers, hairdressers, nail bars and salons, skin and body piercing services, sports and massage therapists and tattooists also have to display the poster. For more information about the app, including a guide for businesses to create their posters, please visit www.wolverhampton.gov.uk/covid-19-mobile-app or www.covid19.nhs.uk.

Businesses should ensure their customers and visitors are able to check in using the app. If customers don't have a smartphone, or are unable to download the app, businesses should take contact details manually for Test and Trace purposes, and have the right to refuse entry if these are not supplied.

Symptoms of Covid-19 include a fever, a new, continuous cough and loss or change to a person’s sense of taste and smell. People with symptoms, no matter how mild, should immediately self-isolate and book a test by visiting www.nhs.uk/coronavirus or calling 119. Anyone who tests positive for Covid-19 will be contacted by NHS Test and Trace and will be asked to share information about people that have been close contacts recently.

Latest data shows there were 66.43 cases of Covid-19 per 100,000 people in Wolverhampton in the seven days up to 21 September, compared to 53.83 per 100,000 in the seven days to 14 September.

The latest information and guidance around coronavirus is available at www.gov.uk/coronavirus and on the council’s own coronavirus pages at www.wolverhampton.gov.uk/coronavirus. For details of local lockdown measures in force in Wolverhampton, visit www.wolverhampton.gov.uk/restrictions.