Thread by @AlbertoNardelli

NEW: The UK's most senior public official — cabinet secretary Mark Sedwill — went to the Cheltenham Festival as the World Health Organization declared the coronavirus a pandemic buzzfeednews.com/article/albert…

The Cabinet Office declined to say whether Sedwill paid for his own tickets or whether he received them as a gift.

On day two of Cheltenham, the WHO declared the coronavirus a pandemic. The day after the festival ended, the government started briefing it would ban mass events

Holding the event was of course in line with government guidance at the time.

However, it does matter that the UK's most senior public official went to watch horses race in mid-March, in the middle of a debate about lockdown

1. several studies since have suggested that mass gatherings such as Cheltenham contributed to the spread of the virus. See, for example, this excellent piece by @bopanc wsj.com/articles/super… and this by the BBC specifically about the Festival bbc.co.uk/news/uk-527970…

2. the Sunday Times reported this weekend that the government was warned in early March that 100,000s could die if tougher measures were not introduced — it took three weeks for those measures to be introduced thetimes.co.uk/past-six-days/…

3. A scientific adviser has confirmed the central claims of the Sunday Times story. Those (or similar) 3-5 March projections were made in 2 separate papers that have not been made public, but their existence is listed in this spreadsheet of document titles assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/upl…

"It took 2–3 weeks for the UK government to be persuaded that there was no ‘controlled epidemic’ scenario which would lead to anything other than hundreds of thousands of deaths and the NHS falling over"

Full story: buzzfeednews.com/article/albert…