May 2020

5th May

Sir Patrick Vallance, the government’s chief scientific adviser, told the health and social care committee that ahead of lockdown on 23rd March, “we saw a big influx of cases, probably from Italy and Spain, looking at the genomics of the virus in early March, seeded right across the country”.

 

6th May

Boris Johnson told the House of Commons, when answering a question put by Sir Keir Starmer, leader of the Opposition, about the UK’s testing programme in March: “A-a-as I think is readily apparent, Mr Speaker, to everybody who has studied the, er, the situation, and I think the scientists would, er, confirm, the difficulty in mid-March was that, er, the, er, tracing capacity that we had – it had been useful … in the containment phase of the epidemic, er, that capacity was no longer useful or relevant, since the, er, transmission from individuals within the UK um meant that it exceeded our capacity … As we get the new cases down, er, we will have a team that will genuinely be able to track and, er, trace hundreds of thousands of people across the country and thereby to drive down the epidemic. And so, er, I mean, to put it in a nutshell, it is easier, er, to do now – now that we have built up the team on the, on way out – than it was as, er, the epidemic took off …”

[with acknowledgement to Matthew Parris, a former Conservative MP

and now a columnist for The Times for transcribing this gibberish]

 

7th May

The Guardian published details of a “secret” government report in 2017 that said the UK was not prepared for a pandemic and forewarned of the COVID-19 crisis in care homes.

The report was based on the findings of a government simulation of an influenza pandemic, codenamed Exercise Cygnus. It concluded that Britain was not adequately prepared for a flu-like pandemic’s “extreme demands”.

The report contained 26 recommendations, including boosting the capacity of care homes and the numbers of staff available to work in them. It also warned of the challenge facing homes asked to take in patients from hospitals.

Asked about the report on Exercise Cygnus, the health secretary, Matt Hancock, said he had been assured by officials at the Department of Health that “everything that was recommended was done”. [Appendix 5]

 

10th May

Boris Johnson set out a three-step plan to end the lockdown and said anyone who could not work from home should now go to work under his plan to “restore the freedoms that we need”. Step one, with immediate effect, included: back to work if can’t work from home, unlimited exercise within households, day trips to parks and beaches allowed, stay off public transport. Step two, not before 1st June, year 1 and year 6 groups go back to school (with secondary schools closed until September), phased reopening of non-essential shops. Step 3, not before 1st July, hospitality sector to reopen with social distancing, and, not before autumn, cinemas, pubs, gyms and hairdressers to reopen and crowds to be allowed at sporting events,

 

11th May

Ahead of the planned relaxation of some restrictions on 13th May, trains were packed in the Monday morning rush-hour with many people not wearing face masks. It was claimed that Boris Johnson had issued “confusing' guidance” on going back to work. Photographs showed travellers unable to social distance on tube trains, as well as busy roads as people headed to work. The Prime Minister had said that anyone in England who couldn’t work from home, for instance those in construction or manufacturing, should now be “actively encouraged” to go to work from “this week”. He had also urged people to avoid public transport if possible, advising people to cycle or drive.

• The PM said that, in the end, it would be the public’s “good solid British common sense” that would see the country through the coronavirus crisis. Commenting on this The Glasgow Herald said that the UK government’s application of common sense seemed to be somewhat wanting in what at times looked like a Gorgonzola strategy: full of holes.

 

11th May

The government published what it called a “roadmap”. This set out that non-essential retail businesses could reopen in phases from 1st June, where and when it was safe to do so, and if those businesses could meet new working safety guidelines. Reopening other businesses and public places would take place, it said, “when the science allows and when they can meet new COVID-19 secure guidelines which relate to their specific activities”.

Five “taskforces”, each led by a government minister, would be set up to sort out the guidelines, with separate sectoral sub-groups working under each taskforce to examine issues specific to each sector.

The taskforces:

• Pubs and restaurants – Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy;

• Non-essential retail (including salons) – also Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy;

• Recreation and leisure, including tourism, culture and heritage, libraries, entertainment and sport – Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport;

• Places of worship – Ministry for Housing, Communities and Local government;

• International aviation – Department for Transport.

 

13th May

At Prime Minister’s Questions in the House of Commons, Labour’s Sir Keir Starmer accused Boris Johnson of ceasing publication, after seven weeks of daily announcements, of international comparisons of COVID-19 deaths because of the UK being worse than anywhere else in Europe. Sir Keir said it was “obvious” the government had stopped talking publicly about the figures because they showed the UK was in an “unenviable place”. But Mr Johnson said it was “premature” to look at international death comparisons and said the Labour leader would have to “contain his impatience”. [Appendix 3]

• It was widely reported that 33 bus drivers in London had died from COVID-19. Data released by the Office for National Statistics showed that bus drivers in England and Wales were dying from COVID-19 five times faster than National Health Service workers. The death rate for bus and coach drivers was 26.4 per 100,000 cases. Only taxi drivers had suffered a higher death rate: 36.4 deaths per 100,000, based on 76 deaths.

 

16th May

Writing in The Times, former Conservative MP Matthew Parris said of the NHS: “The front line has had a good, even heroic, war. So have many hospitals. But the bureaucracy – NHS England, NHS Providers – have come across as a confused heap, unable even to explain themselves. This pandemic should not be seen as an argument for uncritical admiration of our health service.”

 

20th May

Boris Johnson told the House of Commons (during Prime Minister’s Questions) that he had growing confidence that the UK would have a “world-beating" system to test, track and trace for coronavirus up and running by 1st June.

The plan was to be able to trace the contacts of up to 10,000 new cases a day, with 24,000 trackers having already been recruited. “We’re making vast progress in testing and tracing,” the PM said, “and I have great confidence that by June the 1st that will enable us, that will help us very greatly, to defeat this disease and move the country forward.” [This turned out to be wishful thinking and a typical over-statement; even in September there was no world-beating system in place though things did appear to be getting a little better by then and an app was introduced in the middle of that month.]

 

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