Covid-19 public inquiry: First Minister to face questions over Wales’ pandemic preparedness

First Minister Mark Drakeford and former Health Minister Vaughan Gething will answer questions today at the UK public inquiry into the handling of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The pair will be questioned on the preparedness of Wales for the health crisis.

Mr Drakeford and Mr Gething, who served as health minister for five years until May 2021, will both give evidence at the inquiry in London.

Their testimonies are expected to shed light on the strategies and decisions made at the height of the pandemic in Wales.

Sir Frank Atherton, former Chief Medical Officer for Wales, faced questions on Monday about the preparedness of the Welsh NHS for high-consequence infectious diseases before the pandemic.

During the hearing, Hugo Keith KC, counsel to the inquiry, referred to the situation as a “yawning chasm in terms of preparedness.”

He highlighted that in 2019, the Welsh NHS lacked the facilities to treat a patient who contracted Mpox and two individuals who had been in contact with them.

The inquiry also revealed emails from a Public Health Wales official in the same year, stating there was “urgent work to be done” to ensure NHS Wales could respond to “cases of high-consequence infectious disease anywhere in the country.”

A workshop readout from May 2019, run by Atherton and Wales’s then-chief nursing officer Jean White, described the country’s diagnosis and testing services as “fragile.”

The report indicated that health services were “struggling to deliver on a day-to-day basis the prevention, early diagnosis and frontline support that professionals and the public require.”

Atherton, who became the Welsh CMO in 2016, acknowledged the “fragility” of diagnostic testing.

However, he stated that he had initiated measures to address the issue in 2019, before the onset of the pandemic.

He assured the inquiry that “significant work was going on around preparedness,” and that he, along with other officials working in civil contingency, had identified the need for additional resources for pandemic planning.

Dr Andrew Goodall, who has been at the helm of Health and Social Services/NHS Wales since June 2014, spoke about the Welsh Government’s response to the pandemic. He highlighted the importance of the Test, Trace, Protect strategy and the establishment of field hospitals to increase capacity.

Goodall was questioned about the decision to discharge patients into care homes without testing them for COVID-19. He explained that the decision was based on the guidance available at the time, which did not require testing.

However, he acknowledged that the decision could have been different with the benefit of hindsight.

He also discussed the challenges faced by the health service, including the need to balance the response to the pandemic with the continuation of other health services.

He mentioned the impact of the pandemic on mental health services and the efforts to address this.

Commenting on Monday’s evidence, Welsh Conservative Shadow Minister for Health, Russell George MS, said:

“It was worrying to hear today about the sheer lack of planning and preparedness and the inability for the Welsh Government to think about any possible negative outcomes – which has ultimately cost the lives of people in Wales.

“The reports from 2014 clearly highlighted the ‘inherent unpredictability’ of respiratory viruses, which should have been a wake-up call for the Welsh Government.

“With this information why didn’t the Welsh Government thoroughly explore all the possible scenarios? And why were these documents not updated and have they been updated now?

“Could it be, as the CMO admitted, that his office was under resourced before the pandemic and was this caused by a lack of leadership from the Welsh Government.”