Professor joins backlash against tactics to beat coronavirus

AN Exeter University professor of medicine is among 32 doctors and scientists who have jointly written to Boris Johnson in the hope of convincing him not to send Britain into a second lockdown.

The academics accuse the government of not having a clear strategy for living with Covid-19 and that its policy is ‘inconsistent’.

They added that there must be a limit to the sacrifices that can be made to slow the virus, and that deaths could be kept down with targeted measures rather than national lockdowns.

The open letter, dated September 21, was written by Oxford’s Professor

Sunetra Gupta and Professor Carl Heneghan, by the University of Buckingham’s Professor Karol Sikora, and by Sam Williams, director of the consultancy firm Economic Insight.

Among those who signed it is professor Louise Allan of geriatric medicine at Exeter University. She also works as a geriatrician in the memory clinic at the Royal Devon and Exeter Hospital.

The letter states: “We are writing with the intention of providing constructive input into the choices with respect to the Covid-19 policy response. We also have several concerns regarding aspects of the existing policy choices that we wish to draw your attention to.

“In summary, our view is that the existing policy path is inconsistent with the known risk-profile of Covid19, and should be reconsidered.

“The unstated objective currently appears to be one of suppression of the virus, until such a time that a vaccine can be deployed.

“This objective is increasing unfeasible... and is leading to significant harm across all age groups, which likely offsets any benefits.

“Instead, more targeted measures that protect the most vulnerable from Covid, whilst not adversely impacting those not at risk, are more supportable. Given the high proportion of Covid deaths in care homes, these should be a priority. Such targeted measures should be explored as a matter of urgency, as the logical cornerstone of our future strategy.”

The letter comes amid fierce criticism from experts of the government’s top scientists after they presented a ‘doomsday’ scenario of 50,000 daily coronavirus cases within a month.

Toughened coronavirus restrictions were announced this week including pubs, bars and restaurants to close at 10pm, people told to work from home and increased fines for breaching the rules.