Britain was ill-prepared for COVID-19 pandemic and failed its citizens, inquery finds.

Inquiry finds Britain was ill-prepared for COVID-19 pandemic and failed its citizens An inquiry into the U.K. government's response to COVID-19 found it was ill-prepared for a pandemic and serious errors in planning failed its citizens. AP News

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Retired judge Heather Hallett, who is leading the ongoing inquiry, said the government wrongly believed in 2019 that it was one of the best-prepared countries in the world for an outbreak and it anticipated the wrong pandemic — influenza.

“This belief was dangerously mistaken,” Hallett said in releasing her first report. “In reality, the U.K. was ill-prepared for dealing with the whole-system civil emergency of a pandemic, let alone the coronavirus pandemic that actually struck.”

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