UK COVID-19 Inquiry Finds Delayed Lockdown Led to 23,000 Excess Deaths: "Too Little, Too Late"

UK recorded more than 235,000 deaths involving COVID-19 up to the end of 2023 (Representational)

London:

The UK government's response to the COVID-19 pandemic was frequently characterized as "too little, too late," with an official inquiry concluding that a one-week delay in implementing mandatory lockdown during the initial 2020 wave resulted in approximately 23,000 excess deaths, according to a report released Thursday in London.

The report titled 'Core UK decision-making and political governance' constitutes the second module of a comprehensive investigation into the United Kingdom's pandemic response, led by Baroness Heather Hallett.

With the UK officially recording over 235,000 COVID-19 related deaths through the end of 2023, the report determines that this figure could have been significantly lower had the four devolved governments of England, Wales, Scotland, and Northern Ireland not "failed to appreciate the scale of the threat or the urgency of response it demanded."

"When they did realise the scale of the threat, politicians and administrators in the UK government and the devolved administrations were presented with unenviable choices as to how to respond," stated Hallett. "Whatever decision they took, there was often no right answer or good outcome. They also had to make decisions in conditions of extreme pressure. Nonetheless, I can summarise my findings of the response as 'too little, too late'."

"The Inquiry has therefore identified a number of key lessons learned to inform the response to a future pandemic. In all, I make 19 key recommendations that I believe will better protect the UK in any future pandemic and improve decision-making in a crisis," she added. Her recommendations include urgent reform and clarification of emergency decision-making structures within each of the four governments.

Additional key recommendations emphasize the importance of clearly communicating decisions and their implications to the public, with laws and guidance designed to be easily comprehensible.

The report calls for enhanced parliamentary scrutiny of emergency powers usage and improved consideration of how emergency decisions might impact the most vulnerable populations. Module 2 of the 'UK COVID-19 Inquiry' represents the second of ten investigations focusing on the UK's governance and political decision-making during the pandemic.

The Inquiry collected testimonies from current and former senior politicians, including former Prime Minister Boris Johnson who led the government during the crisis, as well as prominent scientists, key medical professionals, civil servants, and relevant experts.

"The UK government introduced advisory restrictions on 16 March 2020, including self-isolation, household quarantine and social distancing. Had restrictions been introduced sooner, the mandatory lockdown from 23 March might have been shorter or not necessary at all," the report concludes.

"This lack of urgency and the huge rise in infections made a mandatory lockdown inevitable. It should have been introduced one week earlier. Had a mandatory lockdown been imposed on or immediately after 16 March 2020, modelling shows that in England alone there would have been approximately 23,000 fewer deaths in the first wave up until 1 July 2020."

While Hallett acknowledges the difficult decisions politicians faced regarding resource allocation during the pandemic, she emphasizes that better preparation could have prevented some of the "significant and long-lasting" financial, economic, and human costs of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The COVID-19 Bereaved Families for Justice group described it as "devastating" to consider how many lives might have been saved under different leadership. Dominic Cummings, a close advisor to Boris Johnson at 10 Downing Street during this period, receives particular criticism as a "destabilising influence" at the center of decision-making in Hallett's report.

"His behaviour contributed significantly to a culture of fear, mutual suspicion and distrust that poisoned the atmosphere in 10 Downing Street and undermined the authority of the Prime Minister," states the report.

Cummings was found to have been "contributing to a culture of fear," with Johnson failing to "exercise proper leadership in rectifying the toxic and chaotic culture adversely affecting decision-making" throughout the pandemic.

Before the report's release, Cummings took to social media to distance himself from its findings, noting that he had declined to participate. "It is important for the public to realise that on most of the big questions, the 'experts', including the senior scientists, were completely wrong in Q1 2020. They advised us to do almost nothing," he claimed.