1 year ago
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Former health secretary’s spokesperson says claims made by the Daily Telegraph are a ‘distorted account’
Good morning. Covid has soared backed to the top of the news agenda, after the Daily Telegraph published a front page story claiming Matt Hancock ignored medical advice on testing people going into care homes in the early days of the pandemic, when he was health secretary. Hancock says the story is “completely wrong”, based on a partial use of confidential material that is in effect stolen, and published to support the Telegraph’s anti-lockdown agenda.
Hancock is also considering suing the paper for libel.
Matt Hancock rejected the chief medical officer’s advice to test for Covid all residents going into English care homes, leaked messages seen by The Telegraph reveal.
Prof Sir Chris Whitty told the then health secretary early in April 2020, about a month into the pandemic, that there should be testing for “all going into care homes”. But Mr Hancock did not follow that guidance, telling his advisers that it “muddies the waters”.
Having not been approached in advance by the Telegraph, we have reviewed the messages overnight.
The Telegraph intentionally excluded reference to a meeting with the testing team from the WhatsApp. This is critical, because Matt was supportive of Chris Whitty’s advice, held a meeting on its deliverability, told it wasn’t deliverable, and insisted on testing all those who came from hospitals.
It is outrageous that this distorted account of the pandemic is being pushed with partial leaks, spun to fit an anti-lockdown agenda, which would have cost hundreds ofthousands of lives if followed.
What the messages do show is a lot of people working hard to save lives.
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