Covid Inquiry: State failings led to mass death and suffering, damning report concludes - Health Secretaries Hancock and Hunt did not prepare UK for 'catastrophic' pandemic that killed more than 230,0

The UK Government's failure to prepare for a 'forseeable' pandemic led to mass death, 'untold misery' and 'economic turmoil', the Covid-19 Inquiry has concluded. Baroness Heather Hallett, who chaired the Covid 19 Inquiry, highlighting the grave lack of preparedness and resilience that meant the virus tore through communities and overwhelmed the NHS The inquiry said it had 'no hesitation' in concluding that the 'processes, planning and policy of the civil contingencies structures within the UK government and devolved administrations and civil services failed their citizens'. Specially it found: Despite planning for an flu outbreak, Britain's preparedness and resilience was not adequate Emergency planning was complicated by the many institutions and structures involve The approach to risk assessment was flawed, resulting in inadequate planning to manage and prevent risks, and respond to them effectively The UK government’s outdated pandemic strategy, developed in 2011, was not flexible enough to adapt when faced with Covid Emergency planning failed to put enough consideration into existing health and social inequalities and local authorities and volunteers were not adequately engaged There was a failure to fully learn from past civil emergency exercises and outbreaks of disease There was a lack of attention to the systems that would help test, trace, and isolate. Policy documents were outdated, involved complicated rules and procedures which can cause long delays, were full of jargon and were overly complex Ministers, who are often without specialised training in civil contingencies, didn't receive a broad enough range of scientific advice and often failed to challenge the advice they did get Advisers lacked freedom and autonomy to express differing opinions, which led to a lack of diverse perspectives and their advice was often undermined by 'groupthink' But, addressing the state's preparedness, she added: 'There must be radical reform. Baroness Hallett said the Government's sole pandemic strategy, from 2011, was 'virtually abandoned on its first encounter with the pandemic' by then-Health Secretary Matt Hancock.