Spreadsheets

[mudskipper]

Read somewhere that they were adding a column per test - that surely surely surely can't be right... (googles)

UK blames mysterious ‘technical issue’ for missing 16,000 coronavirus cases - The Verge

Seems to be speculation atm

[darmstadt]

UK blames mysterious ‘technical issue’ for missing 16,000 coronavirus cases - The Verge

Seems to be speculation atm

Or just a design fault:

...one lab had sent its daily test report to PHE in the form of a CSV file – the simplest possible database format, just a list of values separated by commas. That report was then loaded into Microsoft Excel, and the new tests at the bottom were added to the main database.

But while CSV files can be any size, Microsoft Excel files can only be 1,048,576 rows long. When a CSV file longer than that is opened, the bottom rows get cut off and are no longer displayed. That means that, once the lab had performed more than a million tests, it was only a matter of time before its reports failed to be read by PHE.

[Andy2]

Don't underestimate excel. UK's whole banking system runs on it.

[BR14]

Don't underestimate excel. UK's whole banking system runs on it.

Bolloks it does

[Whorty]

Currently trending on Twitter in the UK: "VLOOKUP"

You wait until they realise you can do hlookup too

[WTFH]

You wait until they realise you can do hlookup too

What's wrong with xlookup?

[Whorty]

What's wrong with xlookup?

Are you suggesting these muppets are using O365? My bet is they're still using Excel 2010

[BR14]

what's all this mickey mouse software, anyway?
windoze pish.

[darmstadt]

Easy to understand write-up: Coronavirus: Data can save lives, data can cost lives - and this latest testing blunder will likely prove it | UK News | Sky News

[Hobosapien]

Surprised they aren't calling the spreadsheet, "the database".

Aka "THe Matrix"

Don't forget Typhoid Dido is Head of Track and Trace and Head of the agency to replace PHE.

Promoting incompetence to make it someone elses problem. She'll be PM in a few more moves.

Easy to understand write-up: Coronavirus: Data can save lives, data can cost lives - and this latest testing blunder will likely prove it | UK News | Sky News

Summary: 'Protect the NHS' wasn't about people but a friggin spreadsheet. Throw a few more billion at IT and the problem will go away, for a while. Not a bad gravy train to be on if you can sleep at night.