Fatal Flaws In Planning Led To ‘Avoidable' Covid Deaths

Inquiry chair demands radical reform of pandemic plans

- REBECCA THOMAS, TARA COBHAM

Mass deaths and economic pain during the Covid-19 pandemic were driven by "fatal flaws" in planning by the government, civil servants and scientists who prepared for the "wrong pandemic", a public inquiry has found.

The UK Covid-19 Inquiry, chaired by Heather Hallett, published its first report yesterday, focusing on the UK's pandemic "preparedness and resilience". The 217-page report said the government and the civil service "failed" the public as a result of "significant flaws" in preparing for the pandemic, adding that the number of deaths and the economic damage might both have been less extensive had the UK been better prepared.

The report criticised officials for focusing pandemic plans solely on influenza rather than giving consideration to other pathogens, such as coronaviruses.

Government plans prepared prior to the outbreak of Covid described widespread deaths as "inevitable" in a pandemic situation, and, rather than planning to prevent the spread of disease, sought to "manage the casualties and fatalities that would result". As a result of these failures, the UK did not have a sufficient test and trace system when Covid-19 arrived, and was only able to implement “untested" lockdown policies, according to the inquiry.

Up to the end of 2023, more than 235,000 deaths involving Covid-19 were recorded in the UK. According to the report, there was a "damaging absence of focus" on the measures and infrastructure that would be needed to deal with a fast-spreading disease, even though a coronavirus outbreak on a pandemic scale "was foreseeable", it said.