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UK didn’t consider structural racism in pandemic planning, documents reveal

Covid-19 inquiry expert witnesses found almost no emergency planning material that mentioned health inequalities

By Ruby Lott-Lavigna
UK didn’t consider structural racism in pandemic planning, documents reveal
Giant advertising screens at Piccadilly Circus, London, show slogans and the faces of coronavirus patients as part of an NHS and Public Health England campaign to encourage people in Britain to take the virus seriously during the third national lockdown, January 2021 | Mike Kemp/In Pictures via Getty Images
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The UK government did not adequately consider health inequalities like structural racism in its emergency planning before the pandemic, leading scientists have found.

Speaking to the Covid-19 inquiry in London, Michael Marmot and Clare Bambra found that almost no emergency planning reports referred to health inequalities, with “certainly no mention of any of the causes of the health inequalities” such as structural racism.

The two leading epidemiologists speaking on Friday reviewed material generated by several government emergency exercises – including Exercise Cygnus from 2016, which intended to simulate a flu outbreak – to see whether these considered the impact of health inequalities.

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