The messages confirm what advisers like me knew: that during the pandemic, ministers weren’t ‘following the science’ at all
- Prof Devi Sridhar is chair of global public health at the University of Edinburgh
The Telegraph’s Wednesday front page is dedicated to a huge trove of the WhatsApp messages of former health secretary Matt Hancock, which journalist Isabel Oakeshott has leaked to, in her words, avoid a Covid “whitewash”.
The resulting stories will be drip-fed out over the next few days, but we’ve already learned quite a few things from the exchanges. Both Oakeshott and the Telegraph were lockdown-sceptic, and seem to believe the leaked messages will vindicate that view. But those we’ve seen so far confirm what was already obvious for those with a front-row seat on the UK government’s bungling of Covid-19: that there was a huge gulf between what public health experts and scientific advisers were recommending and what the UK government actually did – even as ministers claimed to be “following the science”.
