2023-11-21 02:14:31
Prime Minister Rishi Sunak reportedly said the government should “just let people die” during the Covid-19 pandemic rather than imposing a second national lockdown, according to notes forming part of an investigation into the UK’s handling of the pandemic. crisis.
Patrick Vallance, who was the government’s chief scientific adviser during Covid, made a note in his diary on 25 October 2020 about a meeting involving then-prime minister Boris Johnson and Sunak, then finance minister.
The agenda entry presented at the inquiry recorded how Dominic Cummings, Johnson’s most senior adviser during the pandemic, relayed to Vallance what he said he heard at the meeting.
Vallance quoted Cummings in the agenda as saying: “Rishi thinks it’s enough to let people die and that’s fine. This all seems like a complete lack of leadership.”
A spokesman for Sunak said the Prime Minister would set out his position by providing evidence to the inquiry, “rather than answering each piece piecemeal”.
The inquiry is investigating the government’s response to the coronavirus pandemic that has closed large sectors of the economy and killed more than 220,000 people in Britain and is expected to last until the summer of 2026.
Senior government officials have repeatedly said that the government was unprepared for the pandemic and that a “toxic” and “macho” culture hampered the response to the health crisis.
The danger for Sunak is that the inquiry’s evidence will undermine his attempt to present himself as different from Johnson’s chaotic leadership, despite having been one of that government’s most senior ministers.
Previous evidence showed he was labeled “Doctor Death” by a government scientific adviser due to his “Eat Out to Help Out” policy in summer 2020, which subsidized meals in pubs and restaurants, but was criticized by health experts for spreading the virus.
Por Andrew MacAskill
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