Professor Sir Jonathan Van-Tam, England’s deputy chief medical officer during the pandemic, is set to become the latest government adviser with a front-row view of the crisis to take the stand at the Covid inquiry this week.
His testimony on Wednesday follows that of former chief scientific adviser Sir Patrick Vallance and ex-chief medical officer Sir Chris Whitty, who told the inquiry on Tuesday that Britain’s pandemic plans were “not particularly helpful” and would have been “woefully deficient” for even a flu pandemic.
During Monday’s session, it emerged that Sir Patrick privately referred to Sir Chris as a lockdown “delayer” – as “palpable tension” emerged between the two over policy.
Sir Patrick made an entry in his own diary in February 2021 in which Sir Chris had spoken to him about the inquiry they knew was coming, and whether the lockdown in March 2020 had been imposed too late. “He was a delayer of course,” Sir Patrick wrote.
However, Sir Chris brushed off claims of a row, claiming differences between the pair “were extremely small”.
