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Original poster

Covid response one of UK’s worst ever public health failures according to a report by MPs.

104 replies

Zotter · 12/10/2021 22:29

Sorry if this has been posted already, but couldn’t see a post about it.

A report by MPs headed by two former Conservative govt ministers came out today which says the covid response is one of UK’s worst ever public health failures.

Guardian write about it here www.theguardian.com/politics/2021/oct/12/covid-response-one-of-uks-worst-ever-public-health-failures?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other

A further Guardian article writes: ‘the failure to prevent tens of thousands of deaths during Britain’s brutal second wave of Covid infections was a more serious error than the timing of the first lockdown, senior scientists have told the Guardian, after a damning report by MPs on the handling of the pandemic. www.theguardian.com/world/2021/oct/12/the-real-problem-is-the-repetition-of-mistakes-scientists-react-to-covid-enquiry?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other

BBC have written an analysis on the report here www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-58890472

OP posts:
Orangejuicemarathoner · 12/10/2021 22:30

Everybody knew this. Everybody knew it at the time

DogBirthday · 12/10/2021 22:35

@Orangejuicemarathoner

Everybody knew this. Everybody knew it at the time
This.

A bunch of school mums with a bit of common sense would have managed this 100 times better than this laughable lot.

Tealightsandd · 12/10/2021 22:38

Negligence, not failure.

PrincessNutNuts · 12/10/2021 22:51

You can only judge on results.

Whenever I check we often have the second highest number of detected cases worldwide that day/week.

One of the highest death tolls globally.

Our death toll per million is unimaginably high for the sixth richest country in the world.

If we'd had a competent government we could have had one of the world's lowest death tolls.

And no British children dead because of covid.

Instead we have one of the highest.

And British children die of covid all the time.

New Zealand is the exemplar of how to handle covid.

The U.K. is a cautionary tale of what not to do at every stage from January 2020 to the present day.

Sakura7 · 12/10/2021 22:51

@Orangejuicemarathoner

Everybody knew this. Everybody knew it at the time
Everybody with an ounce of common sense did.

I remember some very heated threads on here at the time though. Some posters seemed downright insulted that anyone would ask why the UK was taking such a wildly different approach to the rest of the developed world, parroting that 'Whitty and Valance are experts'. And their international counterparts are not? What about the overwhelming majority of the UK scientific and medical community who were calling them out?

PrincessNutNuts · 12/10/2021 22:53

@Orangejuicemarathoner

Everybody knew this. Everybody knew it at the time
Even bloody Caprice knew this in March 2020 on Jeremy Vine.
Northernsoullover · 12/10/2021 22:56

They didn't think the public would comply with a lockdown. Everyone I know myself included locked down ahead of the incompetent government's advice

Itisasecret · 12/10/2021 23:01

They still are. Allowing Covid positive people to mix freely because the PCRs are broken is another scandal.

Tealightsandd · 12/10/2021 23:03

remember some very heated threads on here at the time though. Some posters seemed downright insulted that anyone would ask why the UK was taking such a wildly different approach to the rest of the developed world.

Nothing's changed. Another thread right now is full of the 'what else can we do', 'we're not doing any different to other countries', etc fatalism and denial described in the report.

There's little we can do. That group are supported by those in power who opted for the 'let the bodies pile up'.

History will judge the UK - in particular, England - harshly.

Hopefully some lessons have been learned? The NHS has bought monoclunal antibodies, and we have our booster programme. The new treatments are very positive news. Hopefully we'll buy enough of them.

PrincessNutNuts · 12/10/2021 23:07

@Tealightsandd

Negligence, not failure.
Yeah.

You have to try in order to fail, and in early 2020 this government immediately surrendered to the virus and in their lazy, defeatist, negative "plan" was to just let us all get it.

It still is - except when essential infrastructure is on the verge of imminent collapse

LegArmpits · 12/10/2021 23:08

One of my farts could have done better.

peewitsandy · 12/10/2021 23:09

The biggest scandal was of course sending elderly patients with Covid in to care homes without the correct or any PPE. How many lives would have been saved if Hancock, Whitty and Valance had actually ensured there was a ring of steel around the care homes.

I know elderly patients are still being sent home, even with Covid, and a personal situation I know off.

The, failure of the Hospital concerned to send a elderly female patient home with Covid despite her entering hospital for a non Covid reason. This, botch up has directly led to the death of both her and her husband in the spate of 12 days.
This happened in the North East in the last month.

Maybe, there is some kind of evil 'assisted' dying system going on in our NHS Hospitals .

Megistotherium · 12/10/2021 23:16

I don't think it was that bad, it could have been better, but early roll out of vaccination saved a lot of lives, and many people who are enjoying almost normal life now couldn't have enjoyed it if it wasn't for it.

Sakura7 · 12/10/2021 23:27

I don't think it was that bad.

Well the facts say otherwise.

Other countries managed to react in a responsible manner to the initial threat AND run very effective vaccination programmes.

Original poster
Zotter · 12/10/2021 23:30

@Megistotherium

I don't think it was that bad, it could have been better, but early roll out of vaccination saved a lot of lives, and many people who are enjoying almost normal life now couldn't have enjoyed it if it wasn't for it.
Putting aside how bad they were at the start, I think the failure to prevent tens of thousands of deaths during Britain’s brutal second wave of Covid infections was particularly awful. Vaccine roll out good, but Europe quickly caught up.
OP posts:
bizboz · 12/10/2021 23:31

It's not exactly as if they learned from their mistakes either. Our vaccination programme is now lagging behind many others who started later. Our rate of infection is many time higher than most European countries and we are on several countries red or amber warning lists.

Original poster
Zotter · 12/10/2021 23:33

@bizboz

It's not exactly as if they learned from their mistakes either. Our vaccination programme is now lagging behind many others who started later. Our rate of infection is many time higher than most European countries and we are on several countries red or amber warning lists.
V true!
OP posts:
NandJ · 12/10/2021 23:45

Even Blind Freddie could have seen this coming in Feb 2020.

PrincessNutNuts · 12/10/2021 23:56

I don't think it was that bad

Yet somehow one of the countries on earth with the most resources and advantages plus advance warning of what was coming parlayed all that into one of the worst results.

Then learned nothing from the first wave and made all the same mistakes in the second wave.

And still, thousands of British people go to hospital with covid every week and thousands of British people die of covid every month.

200,000 covid deaths is just a case of when. Next summer at current rates. Sooner if things continue to speed up.

AlexaShutUp · 12/10/2021 23:58

@Orangejuicemarathoner

Everybody knew this. Everybody knew it at the time
Yep
KitchenKrisis · 13/10/2021 00:07

We really do need to know exactly what was going on in no 10 so it can never ever happen again.. Ie immediate cross party help or something.

peewitsandy · 13/10/2021 00:08

Are we at about 138K in terms of deaths from Covid presently! Italy are about 131k and France 117K

Italy has a smaller population at 60 Million so death rate is: 2177 per Million

United Kingdom death rate per million is: 2018 per million population

To put some context to death numbers per million we are at no 21 in the World and are dropping down. The worst position the UK was in by terms of death per million was 4th.

This is not to excuse the UK Government for the loss of life , however it is important to compare with similar countries I.E France, Italy .

mrshoho · 13/10/2021 00:16

There certainly was (still is) an attitude in some quarters of 'why are we throwing our economy under the bus to save the elderly/vulnerable etc etc. This attitude that our government initially went with led to the slow response. After experiencing the first wave the penny still hadn't dropped and we were led into the disastrous second wave. All I can say is thank fuck for the vaccine but is this even going to be enough for what is coming this winter? We've been too slow to start vaccinating the 12-15 group.

Bunsnbobbins · 13/10/2021 00:38

The death figure is massaged to only include those in last 28 days.

To compare with other countries, you need to use the reported number of deaths by those certified on the death certificate.

161,798

Bunsnbobbins · 13/10/2021 00:39

And yes we all knew it at the time. Then they did it again during the second wave and they’re doing it again now.