Dido Harding - should she be given greater responsibilities?

[Mumratheevergiving]

So the Government are busy blaming Public Health England and Ofqual for the recent disastrous handling of health and education (despite these being agencies they created, instructed and oversee!) They are now ditching PHE and have given the job of heading up the replacement agency ‘National Institute for Health Protection’ to Dido Harding the conservative peer who is currently heading up the utter shambles that is our track and trace system

So:
YABU Dido Harding is the right person for the job, we’re in safe hands with her at the helm

YANBU Dido Harding’s appointment is political cronyism and her track record is not good enough

Honestly, I do wonder at what point people will say enough is enough & take to the streets- seriously- this country is a festering pit of corruption & greed

Interested to see 3% have said yabu op!
I am terrified for the future of public health. I suspect eye test guy is behind this. He screwed up so badly he got handed more power.

@Midlifelights

Honestly, I do wonder at what point people will say enough is enough & take to the streets- seriously- this country is a festering pit of corruption & greed

We are unlikely to, and opinion polls are not that bad for the government either

British electorate seem very willing to put up with appalling government.

And the next GE isn't for ages. They must feel invincible.

Not the time for an enquiry in the middle of a crisis but the perfect time to reorganise the bodies trying to get us through...

“British electorate seem very willing to put up with appalling government”

Yes, they do. Maybe the coming empty shelves after Brexit might focus the mind a bit more 😬

They'll be counting on it being 'detail' that isn't remembered come the next election, where the success they hope to make of Brexit will be a major factor

(And whatever we think of Brexit, right now the only thing left to hope for is that buy some miracle it's a success. Or at least not a disaster. Which it might be, as they've had tomspend so much of their war chest already)

The person who I'd like to see at the helm of this type of organisation would be one of the doctors who recast the NHS ans the National Covid Service - converting so many wards in such a short space of time (we more than tripled capacity, didn't we?) and gave clear commissioning requirements for new kit (so that other players joined the ventilator/CPAP manufacturing chain). They did it quickly, purposefully, and even though off-topic in the sense they were clinicians much less familiar with the supply chain, they knew hospitals inside out, asked their mates in other parts of NHS to fill in the rest (they left dentists out, which a big fail, but their only one and a free-standing one IYSWIM)

The agility, innovation, focus on need, deep understanding of clinical' needs, and ability to multi-task and manage their time (they were doing this at a time when their patient caseload was rising and becoming more complex) is an often unsung factor in how we got through the first bit.

whatever we think of Brexit, right now the only thing left to hope for is that buy some miracle it's a success. Or at least not a disaster.

It can't be a success, cutting yourself off from your biggest market was always going to be a massive fuck up. Covid just makes it more scary.

I have tried to move on but remain really angry about the lies told and the lies swallowed

Also very shocked and also writing to my MP.

Boris wouldn’t recognise ability and experience because he has none himself.

Wouldn't bother wasting time writing to local MP tbh. Best thing to do is research your nearest marginal seat and donate time or just money to whoever is most likely to beat the Conservatives there.

This has to be the worst bit of cronyism I've ever heard.

It's fucking outrageous, and shows the utter contempt this shower of shite have for the ordinary people of this country.

Surely not. Doesn't she have a long and distinguished career in health protection?

Surely surely the people in charge wouldn't appoint someone without this?!

Interesting tweets about the last report into PHE

twitter.com/admbriggs/status/1295416016877625344?s=21

I can see no explanation other than a wish to control

You know we are in trouble when absolutely crackpot ideas about the country being run by lizards start to look credible

As for test and trace being more effective when local teams familiar with communities are involved rather than the Government’s hastily put together centralised system - who would have thunk it?? Oh and we’re still waiting for Dido’s ‘cherry on the cake’ tracing app - I wonder how much has been squandered on that by now?

The only good thing about them dismantling bodies and heading everything up themselves is that they are going to run out of people to blame, other than themselves!

Even the name is a disingenuous con. They’ve gone from a simple descriptive name to one designed to reassure, even while said organisation is busy asset stripping health services rather than actually protecting anyone’s health.

YANBU
T&T is a shit show that has cost us dearly in terms of money wasted on advisers who never took any calls, negative effect on the economy of the system not working well and not to mention lives needlessly lost.

Boris is always very fawning in public with Dido which is frankly weird.

There is a huge issue with unelected cronies Dominic Cummings, Dido and the rest.

YANBU.The Gov is doing exactly what it wants....the country is sleep walking at the monent. I hope people wake up soon..it is an utter shambles.

@Eve

You forgot to mention married to a Tory MP.

.... I’m a 3rd world country we would be accusing them of rampant corruption.

Considering how well most 3rd world countries have done against Covid, I have to call that out as a baseless insult to 3rd world countries.

Just think about that for a second. The UK - behind "bongo bongo" land as UKIP once put it.

@Midlifelights

Honestly, I do wonder at what point people will say enough is enough & take to the streets- seriously- this country is a festering pit of corruption & greed

Maybe if they discontinue Strictly or something? Most people don't seem to notice let alone care.

Honestly, I do wonder at what point people will say enough is enough & take to the streets- seriously- this country is a festering pit of corruption & greed

Over a million marched last year, and over 6 million (that's nearly 1 in 10 adults) signed a petition and they are already long long forgotten.

People voted for this. That's why they can't do anything about it. The government has a democratic mandate to be incompetent and corrupt - after all it was in their manifesto, so if they weren't there would be upset too. Not least from Putin. He's paid for this.

Who would you recommend to run the PHE successor/transition group instead?

I'm nominating Peter Piot.

lljkk good call (based on me googling an article to find out who he is www.ft.com/content/de0a7c9e-56ff-11ea-a528-dd0f971febbc )

This is exactly the kind of experienced virologist or epidermiologist with years of experience of global novel outbreaks that you would hope to be in a leadership position of this sort.

Still with Dido holding the reins we can expect the horse racing to carry on even if everything else gets locked down again!

For some context; she is Daughter of Lord Harding, Granddaughter of Baron Harding, Studied with David Cameron and is Married John Penrose, Tory MP for Weston-super-Mare. Can't imagine how she got the job

Fuck no! The woman knows nothing about public health and should not be let anywhere near anything to do with health.

There has been a lot of, justified, criticism of PHE for a lot of things and frankly they should have left Public Health to be run locally rather than a national body....but....PHE's role is greater than that of managing epidemics. In fact that's a role that local authority public health teams have been doing for years and very well too. By disbanding this organisation a lot of the national level work on prevention of diseases etc will be lost.

I have no words.

Disclaimer: I'm a public health consultant and have worked for local public health teams, PHE and the govt.