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Lawyer Hugo Keith, who is
counsel to the inquiry, said the coronavirus pandemic had brought “death and
illness on an unprecedented scale” in modern Britain. He said that COVID-19 had
been recorded as a cause of death for 226,977 people in the U.K.
“The key issue is whether
that impact was inevitable,” Keith said. “Were those terrible consequences
inexorable, or were they avoidable or capable of mitigation?”
A group of people who lost
relatives to COVID-19 held pictures of their loved one outside the inquiry
venue, an anonymous London office building. The first day of public hearings
began with a 17-minute video in which people described the devastating impact
of the pandemic on them and their loved ones.
Retired judge Heather
Hallett, who is leading the inquiry, praised the families' “dignified vigil.”
She said the inquiry was taking place “on their behalf and on behalf of the
millions who suffered and continue to suffer” because of COVID-19.
Britain’s pandemic death toll
is one of the highest in Europe, and the decisions of then Prime Minister Boris
Johnson’s government have been endlessly debated. Johnson agreed in late 2021
to hold an inquiry after pressure from bereaved families.
The inquiry is due to hold
hearings until 2026. It will investigate the U.K.’s preparedness for a
pandemic, how the government responded and what lessons can be learned for the
future.
Senior scientists and
officials including Johnson are expected to appear as witnesses. Hallett, who
has the power to summon evidence and question witnesses under oath, is
currently in a legal battle with the government over her request to see an
unedited trove of notebooks, diaries and WhatsApp messages between Johnson and
other officials.
U.K. public inquiries are
often thorough, but rarely quick. An inquiry into the 2003 Iraq war and its
aftermath began in 2009 and issued its 2.6-million word report in 2016.
Hallett says she will release
findings after each section, rather than waiting until hearings conclude.
Keith said the first section
would look at whether British planning relied too heavily on the mistaken
assumption a future pandemic would resemble influenza.
He said that at the start of
the pandemic in March 2020, the government had said that “the United Kingdom
was well prepared to respond in a way that offered substantial protection to
the public.”
“Even at this stage, before
hearing the evidence, it is apparent that we might not have been very well
prepared at all,” he said.
Keith also said planning for
Britain’s exit from the EU, which consumed government energies for years after
voters backed Brexit in a 2016 referendum, distracted resources from work to
prepare for potential pandemics.
“That departure required an enormous amount of planning and
preparation, particularly to address what were likely to be the severe
consequences of a no-deal exit on food and medicine supplies, travel and
transport, business borders and so on,” he said.
“It is clear that such planning, from 2018 onwards, crowded
out and prevented some or perhaps a majority of the improvements that central
government itself understood were required to be made to resilience planning
and preparedness.”