Six weeks of hearings have seen arguments about pandemic planning bound up with old battles over Brexit and austerity
• Covid inquiry hears call for more cash for public health
Some witnesses made tearful apologies; others defiantly denied fault. After six weeks of hearings at the UK Covid-19 public inquiry, the evidence about the UK’s preparedness for the Covid pandemic is in.
The nation was caught badly off guard. That much was probably obvious. By 1 March 2021 the UK had suffered more than 180 Covid deaths per 100,000 people; in South Korea, the number was just three. But after hearing the evidence, the bereaved families put it bluntly: we were “catastrophically unprepared”.
