Former head of Welsh NHS to give evidence to UK 19 Covid inquiry

Hearings in Cardiff are now into the second week.

Dr Andrew Goodall was the head of the Welsh NHS at the time of the pandemic.
Author: Lauren JonesPublished 5th Mar 2024

The UK Covid 19 inquiry will continue to hear evidence later on decisions made by the Welsh Government during the pandemic.

Dr Andrew Goodall who, at the time, was the head of the Welsh NHS and Dr Tracey Cooper, Chief Executive of Public Health Wales, are both expected during this morning's session in Cardiff.

Monday's session heard from Wales' Chief Medical Officer Sir Frank Atherton.

The inquiry was told the CMO wrote the word "omnishambles" in his notebook to express his frustration over information coming from UK level "very late", leaving Welsh officials "on the back foot" during the pandemic.

Sir Frank Atherton wrote the word in the middle of a spider diagram, the UK Covid-19 Inquiry was told on Monday.

He said: "This represents a degree of frustration I think I had which is that sometimes information came from UK level into Wales very late and left us on the back foot on some issues."

Looking at his notebook entry, he said: "So if I read down that list, it seemed odd to me that at some point, the virus was relatively contained at this point, but we were lifting restrictions, but other restrictions were being put in place including face coverings, for example.

"Why were we doing that? Why was Scotland moving more on face coverings at a time when we were relaxing other things?

"So it was a sense of frustration, I think, that there were things happening, that information was not being properly shared between policy leads in the different countries."

The hearings in Cardiff will continue through this week and into next week.

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