THE armed forces have helped deliver more more than 33,000 rapid coronavirus tests across Lancashire.

A special unit from the military assisted in rolling out the Covid-19 rapid testing programme for 194 local businesses and organisations.

While the testing will continue, its involvement in the county has now finished.

The unit has been using Lateral Flow Tests to identify people who may have Covid-19 but are showing no symptoms.

The army personnel provided businesses with the training they need to continue testing their employees in the future.

In total, the unit carried out 33,232 tests with 455 positive results.

Neil Jack, from the Lancashire Resilience Forum which co-ordinates the county's response to the pandemic, said: "Thank you to the armed forces for their work in Lancashire which helped to organise and implement the testing and put us into a position where we can take it on ourselves and continue it.

"I would urge any business who hasn't already taken up this programme to do so."

David James, Supply Chain Director at retailer boohoowhich has an operations centre in Burnley, said:

"We are very grateful to the British army for their support in getting our testing programme started and then training our people so we could carry on testing into the future.

"Lateral flow testing is ideal for big employers like ourselves."