Thanks to Neil for posting this summary of Richard Horton's "10 lessons" drawn from Boris Johnson's testimaony about the UK Covid-19 response.
I agree with Neil that the failure of the British government to absorb and set evidence-informed policy. Horton notes that "...The system of science advice to government was defective." However it was not only a failure of science advice to the government, but a failure of science advice to the country as a whole.
During the pandemic, we didn't know who was responsible for the truth, or whose word to trust. The science advisors themselves were repeatedly caught in error (mistaken comparisons with influenza, for a while advocating a "let it rip" approach, expressing doubts about the feasibility of producing a vaccine, etc.) and nobody was seriously and systematically policing mis/disinformaiton.
I find it puzzling that to this day no country has instituted a knowledge preparedeness strategy to deal with what are now being called "information disorders". Every country has a national disaster/emergency strategy, which includes communication issues, but these don't address damage suffered by information itself.
Chris
HIFA profile: Chris Zielinski: As a Visiting Fellow and Lecturer at the Centre for Global Health, University of Winchester, Chris leads the Partnerships in Health Information (Phi) programme, which supports knowledge development and brokers healthcare information exchanges of all kinds. He is the elected Vice President (and President-in-Waiting) of the World Association of Medical Editors. Chris has held senior positions in publishing and knowledge management with WHO in Brazzaville, Geneva, Cairo and New Delhi, with FAO in Rome, ILO in Geneva, and UNIDO in Vienna. He served on WHO's Ethical Review Committee, and was an originator of the African Health Observatory. He also spent three years in London as Chief Executive of the Authors Licensing and Collecting Society. Chris has been a director of the UK Copyright Licensing Agency, Educational Recording Agency, and International Association of Audiovisual Writers and Directors. He has served on the boards of several NGOs and ethics groupings (information and computer ethics and bioethics). chris AT chriszielinski.com. His publications are at https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Chris-Zielinski and https://winchester.academia.edu/ChrisZielinski/ and his blogs are http://ziggytheblue.wordrpress.com and https://www.tumblr.com/blog/ziggytheblue
