There was a “bit of a row” when former no 10 senior adviser Dominic Cummings said he wanted to attend Sage meetings during the Covid-19 crisis, the UK Covid-19 public inquiry has heard.
England’s chief medical officer Professor Sir Chris Whitty said: “When it was known that Mr Cummings himself sometimes came to Sage, this caused quite a row actually, I wasn’t the person who made the decision to make that possible.”
Whitty has taken the stand at the official Covid inquiry today in a highly anticipated evidence session.
He was at the heart of decision-making during the pandemic, working closely with then prime minister Boris Johnson and others at the top of government.
During yesterday’s session, it emerged that Sir Patrick Vallance, the former government science adviser, privately referred to Whitty as a lockdown “delayer” as “palpable tension” emerged between the two over policy.
Sir Patrick made an entry in his own diary in February 2021 in which Sir Chris had spoken to him about the inquiry they knew was coming, and whether the lockdown in March 2020 had been imposed too late.
“He was a delayer of course,” Sir Patrick wrote.
Whitty: Mass gatherings ‘one thing I would do differently’
Sir Chris Witty has been questioned on how mass gatherings, such as outdoor sporting events, were allowed to continue during the pandemic.
He told the inquiry: “Seeing mass gatherings going on, signalled to the public that the Government couldn’t be that worried.”
He said the problem wasn’t gatherings themselves but the impression that gave “of normality, at a time when you’re trying to signal anything but”.
He added: “That is one of the things I would push to do differently.”
Whitty: ‘Ministers were confusing, not enlightening, public’
Sir Chris Whitty said he repeatedly implored ministers not to talk about scientific concepts they did not entirely understand because they were “confusing, rather than enlightening, the public”.
England’s chief medical officer was pressed about the mish mash of terms at the early stages of the pandemic to describe the government’s approach such as “squashing the sombrero”, “flattening the curve”, “mitigating” and “suppressing”.
Sir Chris said: “Ultimately, my view was a lot of rather fanciful discussion occurred, including between people who did not, in my view, fully grasp the technical aspects they were talking about.”
“I think there was a confusion, some of it stemming from an actual strategic lack of clarity, and some of it in my view stemmed from if I’m honest, a little knowledge being a dangerous thing,” Sir Chris said.
Sir Chris Whitty: ‘My WhatsApps are rather dull… compared to other people’
England’s chief medical officer has described his WhatsApp messages as “rather dull” compared to others at the heart of government during the pandemic.
Professor Sir Chris Whitty said Covid inquiry counsel Hugo Keith KC has probably “had the privilege of reading my rather dull, compared to other people’s, WhatsApps”.
Other witnesses before the Covid inquiry have been shown foul-mouthed tirades by the likes of Dominic Cummings, including repeatedly describing those at the top of government as “c***s”.
The way Boris Johnson made decisions was ‘unique’ – Sir Chris Whitty
The way Boris Johnson made decisions during the Covid pandemic was “unique” and he had a “distinct” style, Sir Chris Whitty has told the public inquiry.
England’s chief medical officer refused to be drawn into personal criticisms of the former prime minister but acknowledged the Government was “chaotic” as the pandemic unfolded.
Full report:
‘Eat Out to Help Out’ was a good idea – and the Covid inquiry’s rewriting of history is dangerous
The then chancellor had to protect public health and the economy, writes John Rentoul. Which is why I raise a glass to his efforts to save the hospitality industry (as I did in my Covid gastropub).
Read John’s full article here:
Mother ‘powerless’ to help daughter in care home during Covid, inquiry told
A mother has told an inquiry her daughter felt she “lost her family” due to restrictions in care homes during the Covid-19 pandemic.
Verona Gibson, a member of Care Home Relatives Scotland, told the Scottish Covid-19 Inquiry on Tuesday her daughter’s physical and mental health declined.
Full report:
Pandemic plan was ‘woefully deficient, even for a flu pandemic, Whitty
Pandemic preparedness plans in place ahead of the Covid-19 crisis were “not particularly helpful” and would have been “woefully deficient” even for a flu pandemic, England’s chief medical officer has suggested, Archie Mitchell reports.
Many have suggested that issues early in the pandemic were down to the fact that the UK’s pandemic preparedness plans were drawn up to deal with flu instead of a coronavirus.
Professor Sir Chris Whitty told the UK Covid-19 public inquiry that it was clear in early 2020 that the plan was not going to be particularly helpful in the crisis and had been drawn up by people who had just gone through the swine flu pandemic, which had a very low death rate.
He said there are some good “building blocks” within the document but many of these blocks had to be constructed “in a rush” in the early days of the pandemic.
“I looked at the pandemic flu plan at the point when we were beginning to worry about this … And it was pretty clear that it wasn’t going to give us any particular help, frankly,” he said.
“So my view was we didn’t have a plan that was going to be useful from a prevention or management point of view – it had a lot of, a large number of useful components within it.
‘Nobody looking at this could say this was ideal,’ Sir Chris Whitty says
The chief medical officer has told the Covid inquiry that “nobody looking [at Britain’s handling of the pandemic] could say it was ideal”, Archie Mitchell reports.
The stunned Covid inquiry lead counsel Hugo Keith KC said: “That is, if I may say so with the greatest respect, quite an understatement.”
But professor Sir Chris Whitty added that he was “not convinced that had we done things differently, it would have led to a different outcome”.
Pressed on whether he could have raised the alarm earlier in the pandemic and with more importance, Sir Chris said: “It’s difficult to work out where you can go once you have talked to all the people I talked to. And it is a very long list of people.”
He said former chief scientific adviser Sir Patrick Vallance also tried to “escalate this to the centre” through the office of Dominic Cummings. “So it is not that there were not attempts to do this,” Sir Chris said.
Whitty defends February meeting in which ministers heard just a ‘short update’ on Covid
Sir Chris Whitty has defended a meeting in February 2020, at a time when he was aware the pandemic posed a “massive threat” to the UK, in which ministers were given just a “short update” on Covid, Archie Mitchell reports.
The inquiry was shown a letter from Downing Street to the Department of Health summing up a meeting on February 4.
“We began with a short update on coronavirus. Following an update from the CMO, the prime minister stressed the need to continue to explain our stance to maintain public confidence in the plan,” the letter said.
The Covid inquiry’s lead counsel Hugo Keith KC said: “There wouldn’t appear, professor, on the face of that paragraph, to be much by way of reflection of the massive threat that you described.”
Sir Chris said the pandemic was still not a certainty. And Sir Chris said he stressed that in a reasonable worst case scenario Britain was facing 100,000 to 300,000 deaths “which, to be clear, it is pretty accurate compared to where we are, sadly, now”.
‘We should have quarantined travellers from China… but it would not have made a difference’
Sir Chris Whitty said the government should have encouraged travellers arriving from China to quarantine for up to two weeks regardless of symptoms, even though it “probably wouldn’t have made much difference”, Archie Mitchell reports.
Many of the cases imported to Britain were from neighbouring European countries such as Italy, the chief medical officer told the Covid inquiry.
But he said while the power of hindsight has led people to take “unduly harsh views” about what could have been done differently during the pandemic.
“Here’s an area which I think we probably should have done something different, even though it probably wouldn’t have made much difference,” Sir Chris said.
