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Leading German scientist condemns British handling of coronavirus

Professor Reinhard Busse said that the UK has been too slow to act, questioning the 'ridiculous' way deaths are counted

The UK government was far too slow to act and had a ‘ridiculous and strange’ way of calculating the death toll, according to a leading European scientist.

Professor Reinhard Busse has a continent-wide overview of national Covid-19 responses to the crisis in his role as co-director of the World Health Organisation unit monitoring the actions taken by governments to tackle health emergencies.

UK scientific advisers told the Government that widespread transmission of Covid-19 was occurring on 3 March, yet lockdown did not begin until 23 March.

Asked whether he thought it was a mistake to wait so long, Prof Busse acknowledged that: “Retrospectively we are always cleverer.”

Germany acted much faster

However, Prof Busse of the Berlin University of Technology, went on to strongly criticise the UK’s handling of the situation.

He said:  “In Germany we had a big debate earlier than in the UK and we came to a pretty quick stance. It only took us a week roughly before we said ‘everything above 1,000 people’ [should be stopped]. Then we had the last soccer game and a few days later we were down at two people who could meet  outside.”

“And at that stage in Germany we were still wondering why the UK didn’t do anything….It is a sign, how much you are willing to look at what other countries are doing and say ‘Ok, maybe they have a good reason to do what they’re doing.”

Prof Reinhard Busse of the Berlin University of Technology
Prof Reinhard Busse of the Berlin University of Technology

Despite having a similar-sized population, Germany has had a fraction of Covid-19 deaths seen in the UK, where fatalities are second in the world after the US.

Some 433 people per million have died of Covid-19 in the UK, compared to 83 per million in Germany.

‘Ridiculous’ death counting

Prof Busse was also highly critical of the way the UK recorded coronavirus deaths. Until last week, official figures only included hospital deaths, greatly underestimating the true total – although fatalities in care homes and the general population are now factored in.

“Frankly…only counting deaths inside the NHS is ridiculous,” he said.

“I know it has changed but to get the idea that you only have to look at dead people inside hospitals – that’s a really strange way to define dead cases,” Prof Busse added.

In contrast to the UK, Germany and many other countries in the world have counted deaths outside hospitals since the early days of the virus.

The UK government has always insisted that’s Covid-19 response is guided by the science and that it made the right decision on the lockdown timing.

“We believe that we took the right decisions at the right time,” a No 10 spokesperson has said.

The Government has also consistently said it is too early to make international comparisons, in part because the virus is at different stages in different countries – with meaningful comparisons not likely to be possible for a year.

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