Bingham: UK needs a pandemic minister
BRITAIN needs a pandemic minister in the same way as it has a defence minister, according to Kate Bingham, the UK’s vaccine tsar.
As experts warn of a new pandemic within five years, Dame Kate says it is crucial to be prepared for the risk.
Dame Kate headed up the Vaccine Task Force (VTF) in 2020 and spent seven months ensuring Britain was the first country in the world to deliver Covid jabs.
However, she says that since her government secondment ended, industry experts recruited have left, taking the UK “back to square one” in its pandemic preparedness.
During a talk hosted by the Cambridge Health Network, Dame Kate said that after she left the VTF, there were discussions in the civil service about creating a post for someone to lead on vaccines.
But the job specification was for a generalist who needed to be good at communicating, she said, and not an expert in the field. “I think it’s a massive hole and it’s the single biggest weakness that we have now,” she said.
“We’re much less likely to get invaded than we are to get the next pandemic,” she added. “In defence, there are funds to look at… what are the potential risks, what are the new technologies, what are all the things we need to be thinking about in preparation and we’ve got none of that [for pandemics].”
She added she “doubts” the topic of increased pandemic preparedness is on Rishi Sunak’s radar.
Dame Kate also said it would be “helpful” to bring in independent experts to help boost the nation’s protection against the next virus, as well as to combat other public health issues.