Public review must ask 'hard questions' on how covid was handled
Hard questions need to be answered and “backed up with data”, he said, highlighting a specific concern around laboratories.. Picture: Denis Minihane.
A public review into how the Covid-19 pandemic was handled must answer "hard" questions and be backed up with data, a leading immunologist said.
Liam Fanning, Professor of Immunovirology at University College Cork, said internal reviews are not enough and this "needs to be thrashed out publicly".
"I know there is a nervousness around that," he said, adding "it’s not to castigate people, but to learn" by having a "good cold hard look” at those difficult years.
A review should include “what was done, what was said, the meaningful Christmas and the value of that, the consequences of it," he said.
“Would we be in a better place tomorrow if the WHO (World Health Organisation) announced there is another pandemic on the way, and we had as much warning as we had the last time?” he asked.
Hard questions need to be answered and “backed up with data”, he said, highlighting a specific concern around laboratories.
“Have we put in the resources, do we have enough laboratories?” he asked. “Do we have enough in category 3 laboratories to handle a pathogen that is classified above the level that covid was classified at (category 2)?
“If covid was categorised as a category 3 laboratory pathogen, we would have been rightly snookered.”
Prof Fanning said development could be done in partnership with universities if this is planned and funded “relatively urgently”.
He recalled that in March 2021 he called for younger people to be vaccinated sooner, so after priority groups such as Cystic Fibrosis patients.
“Where is the exploration of if we had done a model around getting over-55s done, and then shifting to the 18 to 35s where most of the infections were? Trying to control the spread that way?”
The immunologist recalled families standing on ladders to say goodbye to dying relatives in healthcare settings and called for “one really clear piece of work” on whether this could have been managed differently.
“It’s probably easier on reflection, but you could see it happening during the tsunami of the pandemic," he said. "Is that the right approach? Maybe it is the only approach or maybe we can evolve to have systems that will allow a more human-centric approach?"
Describing infection control as "really important", he said the context of those years needs to be taken into account by a public review including the high numbers of people dying in ICUs; becoming severely ill; and developing long covid.
A spokesman for the Department of the Taoiseach said: “The exact format that the evaluation will take is currently under consideration. It is intended that it will be established in 2023.”
He said the evaluation will include “a review of the whole-of-government response to the pandemic and how we might do better and be in a stronger position if another pandemic or other similar type event were to occur".
“It will include a consideration of the health service response covering hospitals, the community and nursing homes, along with the wider economic and social response.”
