The Covid inquiry released findings criticizing significant deficiencies in personal protective equipment availability for NHS staff during the pandemic, alongside substantial financial waste in government procurement efforts.
Chair Baroness Hallett highlighted that £9.9bn of the £14.9bn spent on PPE was wasted, representing two-thirds of total expenditure. The UK entered the pandemic with emergency stockpiles of masks, gowns, and gloves in poor condition and faced unpreparedness for global competition to secure supplies. By the end of March 2020, the emergency stockpile designed to last at least 15 weeks was depleted as hospital demand surged. Only a third of masks in England’s pandemic stockpile were usable, while Scotland had no supplies of high-grade respiratory masks for hospital use. Care homes, GP surgeries, and pharmacies were required to source their own PPE, which the inquiry described as a major planning failure.
The government was forced to write off £9.9bn in unused or expired PPE and £157m in unused healthcare equipment. Scotland wrote off approximately £8m of equipment, Wales £18m of unused PPE, and Northern Ireland £43m of masks, gowns, and gloves at risk of expiry. A separate “ventilator challenge” programme to develop breathing equipment at short notice resulted in £143m in costs for designs never produced.
The inquiry criticized the “VIP lane” established in April 2020, which prioritized PPE contract offers from those with political connections, as a “misguided attempt at prioritisation” that “embedded unfairness in emergency procurement.” However, Baroness Hallett stated she found no evidence of cronyism or corruption by ministers or officials in final contract awards. The inquiry noted that while purchasing excess PPE was preferable to shortages, better demand planning would have produced fairer and less costly outcomes.
The inquiry recommended a comprehensive overhaul of emergency PPE procurement and distribution systems, development of a domestic industry strategy treating healthcare equipment as a strategic national asset, and improvements to the pandemic stockpile warehouse in Merseyside.
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