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An critical independent report regarding the UK's management to the Covid crisis has concluded that the reaction was "too little, too late," noting that enacting a lockdown even one week before might have spared over 23,000 fatalities.

Primary Results from the Report

Detailed through over seven hundred fifty pages covering two reports, the results depict an unmistakable story showing procrastination, inaction and an evident inability to absorb from mistakes.

The account regarding the start of Covid-19 in early 2020 has been described as particularly harsh, calling the month of February as being "a month of inaction."

Government Failures Highlighted

• It raises questions about the reasons why the then prime minister neglected to convene any session of the Cobra response team during February.
• The response to Covid essentially paused over the mid-term vacation.
• By the second week of that March, the circumstances was "almost disastrous," with a lack of preparation, insufficient testing and therefore little understanding about how far the coronavirus had circulated.

Possible Outcome

Even though recognizing the fact that the move to enforce confinement was historic and hugely difficult, enacting additional measures to curb the spread of Covid earlier could have meant that one could have been prevented, or at least proved less lengthy.

By the time restrictions was necessary, the inquiry authors stated, if implemented introduced a week earlier, modelling showed this might have cut the number of fatalities across England during the initial wave of the virus by almost half, equating to twenty-three thousand lives saved.

The failure to appreciate the magnitude of the threat, and the urgency of response it necessitated, resulted in the fact that once the option of enforced restrictions was first considered it proved too delayed and such measures were unavoidable.

Ongoing Failures

The inquiry also pointed out that a number of similar errors – responding with delay and downplaying the pace and effect of the virus's transmission – occurred again later in 2020, when controls were eased and subsequently late restored because of spreading mutations.

It labels such repetition "unjustifiable," stating how the government were unable to learn lessons over multiple waves.

Overall Toll

Britain experienced one of the worst pandemic epidemics in Europe, amounting to about 240 thousand virus-related lives lost.

The inquiry represents the latest from the ongoing investigation into every element of the handling and response of the pandemic, which began two years ago and is due to proceed through 2027.