Doctors’ demand for PPE inquiry

THOUSANDS of doctors have demanded a public inquiry into the failure to provide adequate personal protective equipment (PPE) to medical staff and carers.

The Doctors’ Association UK (DAUK) has launched legal action to force the Government to launch the inquiry, following public anger over the deaths of NHS doctors and nurses.

The action has been brought by DAUK – which represents more than 29,000 doctors working on the front line – and the Good Law Project led by controversial barrister Jolyon

Maugham QC. In a pre-action legal letter to the Department of Health and Social Care, the doctors said they were ‘deeply concerned’ about the failure to supply adequate PPE to the NHS.

They listed ‘recurrent and systemic’ failures in PPE procurement and supply, including the alleged failure to stockpile gowns, face visors or body bags in February, as the disease spread worldwide. DAUK said doctors and nurses had been forced to use makeshift PPE or none at all. A spokesman said: ‘Every healthcare worker death from Covid-19 must be investigated, the issue of PPE has to be considered as part of that.’

Mr Maugham, director of the Good Law Project, said: ‘We must never be forced to ask NHS and care home workers to risk their lives again.

‘We must learn the lessons from recent history.’ The Good Law Project launched several legal challenges against the Government over Brexit. Mr Maugham also faced controversy this year when it was announced he would not face criminal charges after battering a fox to death in his back garden, after it became caught in netting protecting his chickens.

The Department of Health and Social Care said it could not comment on possible legal action.