Explosive claims by the Covid inquiry that 23,000 lives were lost because of a one-week delay raised eyebrows on Thursday night.
Baroness Hallett stated in her executive summary that if the national lockdown had been imposed on March 16, 2020, instead of seven days later when it was actually implemented, the devastating death toll from the first wave could have been halved, according to ‘modelling’.
However, buried on Page 211 of her 760-page report, it reveals this estimate is based on analysis by ‘Professor Lockdown’ Neil Ferguson, the Imperial College academic whose terrifying predictions spooked Boris Johnson into adopting the draconian restrictions.
Professor Ferguson, who quit as a Whitehall scientific adviser after being caught breaking social-distancing rules to meet his married lover, later faced claims from other epidemiologists that his dire warnings were overblown.
On Thursday night, asked if the inquiry had explored the reliability of the data, a source said: ‘The inquiry has nothing further to add. The citations are clear and the report speaks for itself.’
Among the conclusions in her damning report, Lady Hallett, the chair of the £200 million Covid inquiry, found:
Lockdowns might have been avoided
The devastating lockdowns of 2020 and 2021 could have been avoided altogether if only the government had responded to the pandemic sooner.
Explosive claims by the Covid inquiry that 23,000 lives were lost because of a one-week delay raised eyebrows on Thursday night
Baroness Hallett, (pictured) the chair of the Covid Inquiry, who published her damning second report on the pandemic on Thursday
Lady Hallett said the first lockdown, which started on March 23, 2020, ‘might have been shorter or not necessary at all’ if restrictions such as self-isolating and social distancing had been brought in earlier, even by a week.
She concluded that the repeated lockdowns left ‘lasting scars on society and the economy’, brought ordinary childhood to a halt and delayed the diagnosis and treatment of other health issues.
Government acted ‘too little, too late’
Lady Hallett said that by the time a lockdown was considered, ‘it was already too late’, adding it ‘only became inevitable because of the acts and omissions of the four governments’. She said politicians had made decisions ‘in conditions of extreme pressure’ but ‘nonetheless, I can summarise my findings of the response as ‘too little, too late’.’
She said that No 10, as well as the devolved governments of Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, had all ‘failed to appreciate the scale of the threat or the urgency of response it demanded’. Lady Hallett said: ‘None of the governments in the UK had adequately prepared for the challenges and risks of a national lockdown.’
Whitehall was so badly prepared for the virus that ministers were forced to take ‘tough decisions’.
Matt Hancock was ‘over-enthusiastic’
Then PM Boris Johnson was too slow and ‘should have appreciated sooner that it was an emergency that required prime ministerial leadership’, said Lady Hallett.
But he was hampered by the health department giving him false promises that they had the situation under control. Former health department top mandarin Sir Christopher Wormald, now running the civil service, presided over ‘misleading assurances’ about the UK being prepared.
He also failed to rein in ‘overenthusiastic’ health secretary Matt Hancock, who kept ‘over-promising and under-delivering’ to No 10 about having a grip on the pandemic.
The inquiry chair blasted officials and politicians for their glacial reactions as the deadly disease spread from China in January 2020. She described February that year as ‘a lost month’ in which the UK could have made preparations that would have saved tens of thousands of lives. The overall lack of urgency overall in government was ‘inexcusable’.
She quoted Dominic Cummings blaming the Cabinet Office and health department who ‘weren’t banging alarm bells at this point – far from it, they were going skiing’.
Helen McNamara, the former deputy cabinet secretary, also said Mr Hancock had ‘nuclear levels of confidence’ which she described as a ‘problem’.
Scientists ‘advised delay on restrictions’
Lady Hallett pointed out that the scientific advice in early March 2020, from the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (SAGE), including chief medical officer Sir Chris Whitty, had warned ministers not to introduce restrictions too early.
Their advice to ministers was that any premature lockdown measures would risk the public suffering ‘behavioural fatigue’.
She said SAGE suffered from ‘groupthink’, with dissenting voices failing to be heard: ‘The incorporation of multiple voices, including those with dissenting views, helps to build sufficient challenge into the advisory process and guard against ‘groupthink’.’
‘Oscillating’ PM Boris Johnson
Later, when the second lockdown approached, Lady Hallett criticised Mr Johnson who ‘throughout September and October 2020, repeatedly changed his mind on whether to introduce tougher restrictions and failed to make timely decisions’.
She said the ‘weakness of the restrictions used and Mr Johnson’s oscillation enabled the virus to continue spreading at pace’.
Lady Hallett said: ‘Mr Johnson’s own failure to appreciate the urgency of the situation was due to his optimism that it would amount to nothing, his scepticism arising from earlier UK experiences of infectious diseases, and, inevitably, his attention being on other government priorities.
‘This was compounded by the misleading assurances he received from the Cabinet Office and the Department of Health and Social Care that pandemic planning was robust.’
Rule-breaking by ministers and advisers
The inquiry chair also addressed the issue of rule-breaking by ministers and advisers, saying that the ‘very least the public should be entitled to expect is that those making the rules will abide by them’. She said several incidents, such as Mr Cummings’s trip to Barnard Castle and Mr Hancock’s affair, undermined trust in the government.
Treasury failed to assess economic impact
The report repeatedly condemns ‘significant concerns’ about the quality of economic modelling during the pandemic. The inquiry heard there was ‘no meaningful model’ of the devastating costs to the economy, unlike a large amount of scientific advice.
Lady Hallett said: ‘There was little evidence in each of the four nations of substantive economic modelling and analysis being provided to decision-makers. This inevitably hampered the ability of decision-makers to assess and balance relative harms.’
Confusing rules and disproportionate fines
Lady Hallett also took aim at confusing Covid rules and regulations.
She said there ‘was a growing public confusion regarding the numerous changes’ and even the police were baffled about enforcing fines.
She added that ‘frequent and complex changes to the rules’ undermined public trust, and Downing Street should have done more to ensure guidance reflected the law.
