Thread by @MartinRemains

‘There are profound questions to be answered, about why Johnson’s government stood alone among the countries of the world, pursuing that herd immunity approach, and why, when they realised stricter measures were needed, the lockdown was still delayed.’ theguardian.com/world/2020/apr…

On January 30th: the WHO announced a public health emergency of international concern (PHEIC). ‘The WHO stated then, as it has emphasised throughout, that this highest state of alert required an immediate response.’

Action was warranted immediately... but Brexit.

‘In the absence of a vaccine, the WHO insisted that the virus should be addressed like the operation mounted in South Korea, with extensive testing, tracing people with whom a person testing positive has had close contact, and isolating all of them, “to interrupt virus spread”.’

“Coronaviruses are horrible,” Nabarro said. “They’re rather stable and incredibly well designed to wreak havoc among populations because they are very, very easy to transmit and quite tough to contain.”

“You can’t just let this thing go, and let it wash over your society, because it will kill lots of old people, and a few younger people, it will make hospitals into a big mess, and it will endanger health workers.”

‘On 3 February, Johnson made another triumphal Brexit speech, in which he even sounded a note against responding too strongly to Covid-19, arguing it ran counter to his vision of Britain as a “supercharged champion” of global free trade.’

More ignoring the emerging pandemic.

‘He was labelled a “part-time prime minister”... on 28 February, after he spent 12 days away at the Chevening country residence in Kent, and did not attend four of the first five meetings of the Cobra committee, convened to consider Britain’s response to Covid-19’.

Mr Johnson ignored the emerging pandemic, already a global health emergency, during the whole of February.

‘Supposed to be impartial and free from political influence, Sage responds to questions passed down from Cobra. Its own makeup has been criticised by some as too narrow, overly reliant on epidemiologists who specialise in mathematical modelling.’

‘One participant told the Guardian that Sage lacked diversity and was “way too slow” to consider how other countries, including those in south Asia, were managing to contain the spread of the virus.’

‘government has published some details... Nervtag membership & minutes of meetings, & some limited papers from SPI-M & SPI-B. Yet even these few documents do establish that Covid-19’s catastrophic threat to life was communicated clearly to ministers by the scientific advisers.’

2 March: ‘SPI-M reported very stark assessments to Sage. “It is highly likely that there is sustained transmission of Covid-19 in the UK at present,” it said. The coronavirus was noted to be highly contagious, with each infected person infecting two to three more.’

If “stringent measures” were not imposed, “... around 80% of the population [53 million people] becoming infected”. SPI-M’s best estimate of the death rate was 0.5% to 1%: between 250,000 and 500,000 people. Of those requiring hospital treatment, 12% were likely to die. ‘

‘Yet somehow, the genuine peril and need to act fast was not seized on by the government. The first phase of a plan to contain the virus with testing and tracing was ended on 12 March, and the policy moved to try to delay the peak of the infection.’

‘the plan was for “mitigation”, for a series of measures to be gradually brought in: “case isolation” of seven days for somebody who felt they had symptoms, then “household isolation” for everybody living with them to quarantine themselves for 14 days...’

‘Over the next fortnight, as Italy moved to impose a lockdown, France and Spain began to do the same, and Germany embarked on physical distancing measures coupled with Europe’s most extensive testing and contact tracing operation, Britain did comparatively little.’

‘Hand-washing was still the main advice, along with case isolation of people feeling symptoms.’

Too little. Too slow. Not ‘the science.’

“The prime minister was going around shaking people’s hands to demonstrate that there wasn’t a problem. There was a disconnect at that point. We were all slightly incredulous that that was happening.”

‘Some experts believe Britain’s exceptional response arose in part because government preparations for a pandemic were so weighted to a flu outbreak. Prof Graham Medley, a Sage member and the chair of SPI-M – which stands for scientific pandemic influenza – modelling – explains.’

‘Scientists are used to seeing flu spread through populations very fast, then become milder as it mutates, and to seeing people indeed develop immunity and populations become resistant. Covid-19 is lethally different’

‘Covid-19 is lethally different, new, its properties more uncertain, and the idea of addressing it by allowing it to move through the population and attain herd immunity was widely condemned for risking far too many lives.’

‘Given the repeated denials, it can be overlooked that the reason the world believes that attaining herd immunity was the government’s approach is largely because Vallance said it was. On Friday 13 March...’

“Our aim is to try and reduce the peak, broaden the peak, not suppress it completely,” Vallance explained on BBC Radio 4’s Today programme: “... the vast majority of people get a mild illness, to build up some kind of herd immunity, so more people are immune to this disease”

‘Few mitigation measures were yet put in place. The week is remembered for the mega-events that went ahead: the Cheltenham Festival of horseracing, the Liverpool v Atletico Madrid Champions League tie, the Stereophonics concert in Cardiff.’

‘That same day, a further explanation of the government’s strategy was given by Dr David Halpern, a psychologist who heads the Behavioural Insights Team, a company part-owned by the Cabinet Office, which it advises.’

“There’s going to be a point... where you’ll want to cocoon, you’ll want to protect those at-risk groups so that they basically don’t catch the disease, and by the time they come out of their cocooning, herd immunity’s been achieved in the rest of the population.”

‘Whitty announced then that the initial effort to contain the disease by testing and tracing had been abandoned, yet despite that, and Johnson’s dire warning, the measures discussed for the new “delay” phase were almost negligible.’

I remember being astonished at the stupidity.

‘People over 70 were advised not to go on cruises. Johnson said even “household quarantine” would not be required until sometime “in the next few weeks”. The government’s published plan did say that social distancing and school closures could be considered.’

Sweet fuck all.

‘That evening, the former health secretary Jeremy Hunt spoke on the BBC, saying he was concerned Britain had become an “outlier”. Hunt says now he became worried that Whitty was too resigned to the virus spreading’

It certainly looked like govt were doing next to nothing.

“I couldn’t understand why they were so certain that nothing could be done to stop nearly 60% of our population becoming infected, when I had figures showing that even in Wuhan, the centre of the outbreak in China, less than 1% of the population actually became infected.”

‘Vallance made his media appearances the following day, explaining the herd immunity approach. He was asked on Sky News why in the UK “society was continuing as normal”, and it was put to him that a 60% infection rate would mean “an awful lot of people dying”.’

‘Matt Hancock, the health secretary, issued the first denial that herd immunity was part of the government’s plan, despite Halpern and Vallance having days earlier indicated that it was, in a column in the Sunday Telegraph on 15 March.’

‘a dizzying number of experts were sounding the alarm. An open letter issued on 14 March dismissing herd immunity as “not a viable option” and calling for stricter social distancing measures so that “thousands of lives can be spared” was signed by more than 500 UK scientists.’

‘Guardian asked Ferguson how that policy could be contemplated, if it predicted that 250,000 people would die. He emphasised that he was never sanguine about people dying, and made it very clear that it was the politicians, not the scientists, who decided on policies to pursue.’

‘Medley told the Guardian that Johnson, Hancock and other ministers continually saying they have been guided by the scientists has “sometimes gone a bit past the mark”. Asked if he meant that the politicians were passing the buck, Medley replied: “Yes.”’

‘Even after the stark warning that the NHS would be overwhelmed if the policy did not change, Johnson and his government still hesitated.’

‘The delay to introducing stricter measures, until the lockdown was finally ordered on 23 March, appears to have been at least partly based on a flawed misreading of the government’s own scientific advice.’

“There is a risk if we go too early people will understandably get fatigued and it will be difficult to sustain this over time.”

‘Hancock supported that, suggesting it was the result of official advice. “The evidence of past epidemics and past crises of this nature shows that people do tire of these sorts of social distancing measures, so if we start them too early, they lose their effect”’

‘this concept of “fatigue” was rejected by the behavioural scientists appointed by the government itself to Sage’s subcommittee, SPI–B. “The word was never used in any of our committee reports,” said Susan Michie, a SPI-B member. “It is just not a concept that exists”’

‘Four other members of SPI-B also told the Guardian that the committee never advised that people would tire of restrictive measures.’

‘Three behavioural scientists on SPI-B... even wrote an article for the Psychologist journal, rejecting the notion of “fatigue” and suggesting that delaying stricter social distancing measures on that premise was taking a risk with lives.’

Govt did not follow the science.

‘The DHSC source sums up this period soberly: “They knew we would have to go into lockdown; they were debating when. Every single day they wasted, every day we weren’t in lockdown, was resulting in people contracting the disease – people who have since died.”’

‘One source on Sage said there was also nervousness among their group that week, a feeling that the virus was getting out of control and they were not sure the politicians understood its exponential spread.’

‘Reflecting on the presence at Sage of Cummings and Warner, some attendees now say the group’s deliberations were affected by a sense of what could feasibly be done, with a government run by politicians to whom a lockdown looked unthinkable, although others say they were not.’

So that is crystal clear. Cummings affected some of the members of the committee.

‘One source in Downing Street who personally urged the prime minister to stop delaying and move into lockdown that week said his reticence was partly down to his “libertarian instinct”. “There was also a bit of ‘rabbit caught in headlights’.”

Again, not following them science’.

“We didn’t know we were infecting ourselves,” Ken says. “I am really annoyed when I start thinking about it too much. I am furious with the government, with people making decisions, that the virus was spreading at that time.”

‘some experts have argued that the spectacle of Johnson, Cummings, Hancock, Whitty and other advisers contracting the virus indicated that the government was not taking social distancing seriously enough.’

‘That day, 8 April, Elsie was among 938 people reported to have died in hospitals from Covid-19, as the catastrophe in Britain steepled, and so many families, including those of doctors, nurses, other NHS staff and key workers, were plunged into grief.’

Govt: “This is an unprecedented global pandemic and we have taken the right steps at the right time to combat it, guided by the best scientific advice.”

We have seen that this it not true.

“The government has been working day and night to battle coronavirus, delivering a strategy designed to protect our NHS and save lives. Herd immunity has never been a policy or goal.”

We have seen that ‘herd immunity’ was a consequence (if achievable) of their policy early on.

“We have provided the NHS with all the support it needs, made sure everyone requiring treatment has received it and taken unprecedented steps to support businesses and workers, to protect the economy.”

No, they have not. No. Thousands are dead in care homes. Unprecedented? No.

“It would help if they accept their mistakes and apologise. It was slow, the testing and PPE was not adequate, and this virus was allowed to spread. Sometimes you just have to stand up and admit your mistakes, as a human being.”

Not this government of the hardly human.