Failures place millions at risk
Deadly failures by the UK government have placed millions of workers at unnecessary risk of exposure to the coronavirus, according to an analysis for the Hazards Campaign.
The report, by Stirling University professor Andrew Watterson, COVID-19 in the UK and occupational health and safety, sets out failures in the government’s planning and preparation for the globally-predicted pandemic.
It says decisions about containment, testing and tracing have had a profound effect on the health and safety of key workers and on death and illness among the public. By 19 April, the UK death toll from coronavirus in hospitals had passed 16,000, with thousands more dying at home or in care homes.
“Dither and delay has proved lethal and by the third week in March, the expert UK view from those who were researching pandemics was that we had lost at least nine weeks to prepare more fully for the public health outbreak,” says the report.
It shows how government policy failed to draw on and use World Health Organization advice about the virulence, spread and control of COVID-19 and information about best practice on PPE and other health and safety issues.
It also shows we are not “all in this together”. Low-paid women workers and low-paid workers in the gig economy, as well as health and social care professionals in acute, primary care and community settings, are at high risk of COVID-19 exposure.