COVID Infection Survey (CIS)Services Related to COVID-19 - Invitation to Tender for CIS Prime Provider

The Office for National Statistics ('ONS') has a requirement to procure Services related to COVID-19.

ONS was commissioned in April 2020 to conduct the COVID-19 Infection Survey collecting the data which informs HMG's policies and operational interventions regarding the COVID-19 pandemic.

CIS is a repeated cross-sectional household survey with additional serial sampling and longitudinal follow-up which provides an estimate of the proportion and number of people living in private households who would have had COVID-19 in the last week based on trend modelling.

The study is led by DHSC and ONS and draws on the world leading scientific expertise of the University of Oxford.

CIS is the flagship surveillance study and the key source of COVID-19 infection data, incidence and antibody prevalence in UK communities.

We work with key stakeholder partners; PHE, PHS, PHW, the Joint Biosecurity Centre, Ministers, SAGE, and the wider UK Test & Trace programmes to inform required policy and operational interventions.

The Authority requires a Prime Provider to supply and manage an integrated service for the CIS to households in England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland to be made up of the Services listed below: • Supply and integration of Study Workers to conduct fieldwork and their management, including the provision of trained phlebotomists • The provision of data and Management Information • Contact Centre • Courier, Logistics and Warehousing • Future Requirements as Options within the Contract • The Provider, across the service and integration, will play a pivotal role in delivering the established survey activities but will also be required to adapt and be flexible in the way these are delivered.

The pace and scale of change is not predictable, given the unprecedented nature, and hence the data required to support the response to the COVID-19 pandemic.

The Provider's ability and contributions will be fundamental to support this.

Supply and Integration of Study Workers to Conduct Fieldwork and their Management - Overview; The Authority has a requirement for the delivery of all operational aspects of UK fieldwork for The Authority's COVID-19 Infection Survey throughout the period June 2021-March 2023.

This will include overall responsibility of integration of all services, provision of underlying data infrastructure and data flows.

This shall include full survey and fieldwork management, including preparation of training material, recruitment of Study Workers who support participant self-administration of swabs, recruitment of phlebotomists as Study Workers for the collection of venous blood samples and to support participant self-administration of swabs, training and management of the Study Workers, provision of appointment scheduling, supply chain management, venous blood and swab sample management system, end-to-end data flow management, quality assurance, collation of management information, managi...