While the Prime Minister previously said he took the "right decisions at the right time," he has recently admitted the government miscalculated the extent of COVID-19 pandemic. He also warned the public coronavirus may stay until next summer.
"We didn't understand [the virus] in the way that we would have liked in the first few weeks and months," the Prime Minister told BBC's Laura Kuenssberg in an interview on Friday, July 24. He also pointed out they initially did not see the possibility of asymptomatic transmission between individuals. The interview marked the first year since Boris Johnson was elected as Conservative Party leader and the British Prime Minister.
However, as the Daly Express reported, Johnson denied being too slow to act against the disease that killed more than 45,000 people in the UK with nearly 300,000 confirmed COVID-19 cases. The government was also criticized for "mishandling" the pandemic.
Johnson told Kuenssberg during the interview that the crisis was something new, yet the government took all the advice from their advisers for each step they did to manage the crisis. "We stuck to that advice like glue," he said.
The prime minister also clarified that it is difficult to keep the virus under control, particularly with the economy. "I do still think that we have tough times ahead." However, he is optimistic that the U.K. can "bounce back stronger than ever before."
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Currently, the government is trying to strike a balance between reopening the economy without triggering a second wave of the pandemic.
Johnson proposed to keep wearing face masks in shops and enclosed spaces could for at least a year, although he did not mention when the new facemask rule charging a £100 fine for not wearing facemasks in all shops will be lifted.
Instead, the prime minister said using face masks and following social distancing measures depend on the collective ability of British people and the government to dropping the coronavirus rate and keeping it down. "I'm not going to make a prediction about when these various social distancing measures will come off," said Johnson adding it would probably be "the middle of next year."
Read also: Coronavirus-Hit British PM Back to Work; Boris Johnson Warns Against Easing Lockdown
He finally admitted mishandling the pandemic
After hearing the prime minister's interview, shadow health secretary Jonathan Ashworth said this refutes Johnson's earlier claim that the government made "the right decisions at the right time."
"Boris Johnson has finally admitted the Government has mishandled its response to the Coronavirus," Ashworth noted. He criticized the government for being was too slow to acknowledge the threat of the virus, enter lockdown, and even take this crisis seriously.
Last week, Johnson vowed to have an "independent" inquiry about how the pandemic was handled, although he rejected an immediate investigation as assigning large numbers of staff on it would be untimely. He did not discuss any details when the probe will begin.
For weeks, the PM receives continuous criticisms as to whether the lockdown came a little late after Sir Patrick Vallance, U.K.'s chief scientific adviser, told members of the parliament they wanted it applied a week before March 23.
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