‘Dishonest’: COVIDSafe app has not detected a case despite 6 million downloads

The federal government’s COVIDSafe app has not identified any close contacts of a person infected with coronavirus who had not already been found through manual contact tracing, despite being downloaded by more than 6 million Australians in two months.

As the number of infections soars in Victoria, Centre Alliance senator Rex Patrick said the government was being dishonest about the effectiveness of the app, which Prime Minister Scott Morrison touted as “sunscreen” against major outbreaks and as the key to lifting restrictions.

Senator Patrick, who has an engineering background and was a project manager involved in rapid-prototyping and testing, said the government was refusing to concede the app “wasn’t working properly, if at all”.

“I think the Prime Minister and the government were dishonest with the Australian public and I think that that’s very sad,” said the senator, a supporter of the app concept who himself was diagnosed with COVID-19.

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