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This Is Why

COVID Inquiry: Why were we not prepared for a pandemic?

This Is Why

Sky News

News, Daily News, News Commentary

4.0552 Ratings

🗓️ 28 June 2023

⏱️ 20 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

The COVID inquiry has started, with the first part looking into how resilient and prepared the country was for a pandemic.

Former Conservative prime minister David Cameron, ex-chancellor George Osbourne, health secretary during COVID Matt Hancock and the UK government's chief medical adviser Chris Whitty have given evidence so far.

On this Sky News Daily, host Niall Paterson is joined by our health correspondent Ashish Joshi to summarise what's been said so far, and Dr Chaand Nagpaul, former chair of the BMA UK Council from 2017-22 - who represented the medical profession during the pandemic - explores how prepared, or ill-prepared, the UK was for COVID.

Producer: Soila Apparicio
Assistant producer: Amy Lakin
Editor: Danielle Weekes-Chilufya

Transcript

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0:00.0

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1:04.0

Three weeks ago, the COVID inquiry began an independent and public examination of the way the UK dealt with coronavirus.

1:13.7

It's being led by Baroness Hallett, a retired Court of Appeal judge, and this stage is looking

1:18.7

very specifically at how prepared the country was to deal with a public health crisis of this

1:24.1

magnitude. So far, we've heard from the former Prime Minister David Cameron,

1:28.3

former Chancellor George Osborne, at the Chief Medical Officer, Sir Chris Witty.

1:32.3

On Tuesday, however, it was the turn of the former Health Secretary Matt Hancock.

1:37.3

I am profoundly sorry for the impact that had.

1:41.3

I'm profoundly sorry for each death that has occurred.

1:47.0

And I also understand why for some it will be hard to take that apology from me.

1:56.0

I understand that. I get it. But it is honest and heartfelt. And I'm not very good at talking about my

...

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