Lewis was told to praise care for first NI patient, despite doubts from medics

THE Northern Ireland Office advised the Secretary of State to tell the public that Northern Ireland’s first Covid patient was “receiving excellent care” in Belfast — even though it knew doctors believed the individual was getting inferior care.

Among documents published by the Covid Inquiry is a March 2, 2020 situation report which updated Brandon Lewis ahead of a COBR meeting to be chaired by Prime Minister Boris Johnson.

At that point, there had been just 36 confirmed Covid cases across the UK, one of which was in Northern Ireland. That individual had been diagnosed on February 27 and was in the Royal Victoria Hospital.

The briefing told Mr Lewis: “Under the agreed protocol by the UK’S four Chief Medical Officers, the patients would be brought to one of four specialist clinical facilities, all of which are in England.”

He was told that Stormont’s Department of Health had requested Military Assistance to the Civilian Authority (MACA) to fly the patient to the Royal Victoria Infirmary in Newcastle but “this request was denied by MOD”.

The briefing said that Stormont health officials had “confirmed that there are no other transport options (plane or boat) to bring the patient to the hospital” and that “commercial providers will not fly contagious disease patients due to the damage that decontamination does to airframes”.

Mr Lewis was told that “the patient was transferred to a ward in Royal Hospital in Belfast, but in NI clinicians’ opinion, the standard of care is not the same. Expert consultant cover is not available round the clock in Belfast.

“They have arranged that the hospital the patient was meant to transfer to in GB will be available by phonecall 24/7.”

However, despite being clearly told that doctors believed the standard of care in Belfast was inferior to that in England, Mr

Lewis was advised that if asked about the refusal of the MACA request he should say: “I’m pleased that they are receiving excellent care in Northern Ireland”.

Mr Lewis was taken through the document yesterday as he gave evidence to the inquiry, but was not asked about the conflict between what he was advised to say in public and what he was being told in private.

However, he said yesterday that “a MACA request from Northern Ireland was not straightforward to deal with — it had political connotations”.

Mr Lewis said Health Minister Robin Swann would “get frustrated” at the process for MACA requests because “the UK Government getting involved in Northern Ireland is not a straightforward affair” and so MACA requests would only be approved if the whole Executive agreed.

Mr Lewis also said that in autumn 2020 he feared the Executive might collapse as it struggled to make decisions and then the DUP vetoed further restrictions.

He said: “To me, it seems, this had become the public exposure of challenges and problems that had been in the Executive since the Bobby Storey funeral. That changed everything, and this was where it manifested... everything came together at one point and it became very, very difficult.

“The damage was the fact that it took them three days of publicly having a protracted meeting to come to a decision therefore undermined the public perception of the... messaging coming from the Executive.”

He said the inability of the DUP and Sinn Féin to agree on a head of the civil service was also a serious problem.

David Sterling had “given plenty of notice” that he was retiring, having already delayed retirement to assist the new Executive, Mr Lewis said. “It was the fundamental issue of the first and deputy first minister not being able to agree on a candidate and I do think that had an impact for that period,” he said.