Britain was prepared for flu-like pandemic but not a disease like Covid-19, says ex-PM Cameron

LONDON - Former British prime minister David Cameron told an inquiry on Monday (June 19) that Britain was prepared for a flu-type pandemic, but not enough work was done in advance to confront an asymptomatic disease similar to Covid-19.

Britain is holding an inquiry into the handling of the Covid-19 pandemic after the country recorded one of the world's highest death tolls. More than 175,000 deaths from the coronavirus had been reported by July 2022.

Last week, the counsel to the inquiry, Mr Hugo Keith, said that Britain was taken by surprise by many aspects of the Covid-19 pandemic, and had not considered policies such as lockdown and shielding in advance.

It could prove a headache for Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, who was finance minister during the pandemic and faces an election expected in 2024.

However, the inquiry is beginning with preparations for the pandemic and so Mr Cameron is the first politician to give evidence to the inquiry, although his premiership ended seven years ago.

"Much more time was spent on pandemic flu and the dangers of pandemic flu rather than on potential pandemics of other, more respiratory diseases like Covid-19 turned out to be," Mr Cameron, who was prime minister from 2010 to 2016, told the inquiry.

"This is so important because so many consequences followed from that."

Mr Cameron said that while the government did consider other diseases like the Middle East Respiratory Syndrome and severe acute respiratory syndrome, he questioned whether there had been adequate follow-up on that work and the possibility of asymptomatic transmission of respiratory diseases.

"When you think what would be different if more time had been spent on a high-infectious asymptomatic pandemic, different recommendations would've been made about what was necessary to prepare for."

Mr Cameron's finance minister George Osborne will testify on Tuesday, while current finance minister Jeremy Hunt, the health minister under Mr Cameron, will give evidence on Wednesday.

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