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A harsh independent inquiry into Britain's management to the coronavirus situation has concluded that the reaction was "too little, too late," declaring how implementing a lockdown just seven days sooner might have spared more than 20,000 lives.

Key Findings from the Inquiry

Documented in over seven hundred fifty sections across two volumes, the results depict a consistent story showing delay, failure to act and an apparent failure to understand lessons.

The description about the onset of the coronavirus in the first months of 2020 has been described as particularly brutal, labeling the month of February as being "a lost month."

Government Shortcomings Noted

• The report questions why the then prime minister neglected to lead a single gathering of the Cobra response team in that period.
• Measures to the pandemic effectively stopped over the school break.
• During the second week of that March, the situation was "almost disastrous," due to a lack of strategy, a lack of testing and therefore no understanding about the degree to which the virus had circulated.

Potential Impact

Even though acknowledging that the choice to impose restrictions proved to be historic as well as extremely challenging, implementing further steps to reduce the circulation of the virus more quickly would have allowed such measures may not have been necessary, or at least have been of shorter duration.

By the time a lockdown was inevitable, the investigation noted, if it had been enforced on 16 March, estimates suggested this might have cut the count of deaths across England during the initial wave of the virus by nearly 50%, representing twenty-three thousand deaths prevented.

The failure to recognize the scale of the danger, or the immediacy for measures it demanded, led to the fact that when the possibility of compulsory confinement was first considered it had become too late so that restrictions had become unavoidable.

Ongoing Failures

The inquiry also pointed out that several of the same errors – responding too slowly as well as downplaying the speed together with effect of the pandemic's progression – were later repeated in the latter part of 2020, when restrictions were eased and then late restored due to spreading new strains.

It calls this "inexcusable," adding that the government were unable to learn lessons through successive waves.

Total Impact

The UK suffered among the worst pandemic crises within Europe, amounting to around two hundred forty thousand pandemic fatalities.

This investigation is another by the national review regarding every element of the management as well as response of the pandemic, which started previously and is due to proceed into 2027.