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Key UK govt advisor flouts Covid-19 lockdown rules, quits
A professor in Imperial College London, Ferguson was reportedly visited by a woman friend twice during the lockdown.
Epidemiologist Neil Ferguson, whose research and modelling prompted the Boris Johnson government to impose lockdown in March, resigned on Wednesday from a key committee after it was revealed that he flouted social distancing rules, and may face police action.
A professor in Imperial College London, Ferguson was reportedly visited by a woman friend twice during the lockdown. Catherine Calderwood, chief medical officer of Scotland, had resigned in April after it was revealed she visited her second home during the lockdown.
Ferguson was a member of the influential Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies, which has been meeting daily and contributing to the government response to the coronavirus pandemic. The police have been given new powers to enforce lockdown curbs.
Health secretary Matt Hancock said Ferguson had made the right decision to resign, adding he would support police action against the expert. According to him, flouting the lockdown rules by Ferguson was “extraordinary,” and left him “speechless”.
“Prof Ferguson is a very, very eminent and impressive scientist and the science he’s done has been an important part of what we’ve listened to, and I think he took the right decision to resign,” Hancock said.
Johnson faced Prime Minister’s Questions in the House of Commons for the first time after recovering from coronavirus on Wednesday, when Labour leader Keir Starmer subjected him to forensic questioning.
Starmer alleged that the government had been slow to lockdown, slow to test, slow to trace and slow on providing personal protection equipment, which led to the UK registering the worst death toll in Europe.
Johnson acknowledged that the capacity to test in initial stages was limited: “It’s easier to do now on the way out than it was as the epidemic took off. And I think most people with common sense can see the particular problems we had at the time.” He set a new target of 200,000 tests a day by the end of May.
Meanwhile, chancellor Rishi Sunak indicated that the wage-subsidy scheme to pay 80 per cent of furloughed staff up to a limit of 2,500 pounds per month from March to June is likely to be wound down as part of plans to remove lockdown measures.
As the number of UK jobless due to the pandemic grew, Johnson told MPs he would announce plans to gradually ease lockdown measures on Sunday.
