Revealed: The coronavirus outbreak plan ignored by the government during the pandemic

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Andrew Feinberg

White House Correspondent

The Covid Inquiry publishes its first report into government failings over its handling of the pandemic today. The probe has reviewed how prepared the UK was to face the deadly outbreak in 2020, with the findings set to be damning.

It comes after The Independent revealed in 2021 that a ready-made plan was drawn up to tackle a coronavirus outbreak. Despite being published in 2005, it was “lost” in Whitehall and never used during the Covid-19 pandemic.

The document recommended many similar measures to those the government eventually took during the pandemic which swept over the planet from 2020 to 2022.

This included building up infrastructure for virus testing and PPE stockpiling in case of an outbreak.

For the latest updates as the Covid Inquiry publishes its report, follow The Independent’s live coverage

Response measures also included travel restrictions, isolating and testing contacts with infections, and limiting “super-spreader” events.

The plan was drawn up in response to Sars, which was an epidemic less severe than Covid-19, lasting from 2002 to 2004. It was uncovered by The Independent three years ago following a Freedom of Information request.

A former government adviser said the framework could have saved “tens of thousands of lives” if it had been deployed to handle the Covid-19 pandemic.

Instead, it sat in a drawer as the government scrambled to make a plan. One source said it went “missing” shortly after it was submitted, with a senior medical adviser who served in Downing Street throughout the last decade saying they were “totally surprised” to learn of the plan.

Another involved in the early response to Covid-19 said ministers had been “starting from scratch” in February and March 2020, as the outbreak in the UK grew, adding: “There was no awareness of this document.”

“It was overlooked,” said Sir David King, chief scientific adviser from 2000 to 2007, who was involved in developing the document.

“I believe tens of thousands of lives would have been saved. I think the economy would have been in a much better place too.”

The Covid Inquiry has heard from politicians and experts, including former prime ministers Boris Johnson and Rishi Sunak, and former health secretaries Jeremy Hunt and Matt Hancock.

In his evidence, Mr Hunt admitted to the inquiry that the government should have been paying more attention to countries in Asia who were managing to deal with the outbreak more effectively.

This was in part thanks to the lessons learned from the Sars outbreak which severely impacted countries like Taiwan, Singapore and South Korea.

One senior medical adviser during the 2010s told The Independent that they had suggested running tabletop exercises for ministers on Sars, but Public Health England refused.

“I was told, ‘No, it won’t reach here,’” the source said. “This persisted with Covid. This belief that it won’t ever reach here and we don’t need to learn from the countries in Asia. We took a long time to wake up, even when it was in Italy.”

However, they too said the Sars plan could have played a key part in the Covid response.

“We would have known about airflow, we would have protected our staff better and thought about the co-morbidities more. And if we just followed this, maybe we’d have started planning earlier.”

As the Covid Inquiry overseen by Baroness Hallett publishes its first report, it is likely the government’s failure to learn from previous administrations and outbreaks past will form a key part of her findings.