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An harsh government inquiry concerning the UK's handling of the Covid emergency determined that the response were "too little, too late," stating that enacting confinement measures only seven days before would have saved in excess of 23,000 lives.

Main Conclusions from the Report

Documented through more than seven hundred fifty sections covering two volumes, the findings portray an unmistakable narrative showing delay, failure to act and a seeming inability to learn from experience.

The account concerning the onset of Covid-19 in the first months of 2020 has been described as particularly critical, calling February as "a month of inaction."

Government Errors Noted

• It raises questions about why the UK leader neglected to lead any meeting of the Cobra emergency committee in that period.
• Measures to the virus effectively halted during the school break.
• In the second week in March, the state of affairs was "nearly calamitous," due to a lack of plan, no testing and thus no clear picture about the degree to which the virus had circulated.

What Could Have Been

Even though acknowledging that the move to implement a lockdown had been without precedent and extremely challenging, enacting other action to reduce the circulation of Covid more quickly would have allowed a lockdown may not have been necessary, or have been of shorter duration.

When restrictions became unavoidable, the inquiry authors noted, had it been imposed on 16 March, projections indicated that could have reduced the number of lives lost across England during the initial wave of Covid by almost half, equating to over 20,000 deaths prevented.

The omission to appreciate the extent of the risk, and the need for action it required, led to that once the chance of enforced restrictions was first considered it proved too late and restrictions were unavoidable.

Repeated Mistakes

The inquiry further pointed out that a number of of the same errors – reacting belatedly as well as underestimating the pace and impact of Covid’s spread – were then repeated subsequently in 2020, when measures were eased and then late restored in the face of infectious variants.

It calls this "unjustifiable," adding how officials failed to absorb experience during multiple phases.

Total Impact

The United Kingdom experienced among the worst Covid outbreaks in Europe, amounting to about 240 thousand pandemic deaths.

This report constitutes the latest from the national inquiry covering every element of the handling as well as handling to the coronavirus, that began previously and is scheduled to continue through 2027.