What’s going on in the UK: 11-24 July

This week: calls for postgrad childcare support, UKRI funds top emerging talent, support for Ukraine and more

‘Fatal flaws’ in pandemic preparation

Scientific advice to the UK government in the lead-up to the pandemic was too narrow, according to the Covid-19 inquiry’s damning first report. The report pointed to “fatal strategic flaws underpinning the assessment of the risks faced by the UK”, arguing that the government’s “sole pandemic strategy, from 2011, was outdated and lacked adaptability” and that there was “a damaging absence of focus on the measures, interventions and infrastructure required in the event of a pandemic”. Ministers, said the report, “were not presented with a broad enough range of scientific opinion and policy options, and failed to challenge sufficiently the advice they did receive”. Advisers, meanwhile, “did not have sufficient freedom and autonomy to express dissenting views”. In her introduction, inquiry chair Heather Hallett called for radical reform.