It seems as though society has collectively chosen to forget the harsh lessons of Covid-19. There’s a strong desire to move forward, almost pretending the pandemic never occurred. Yet, as history teaches us, if we fail to learn from past mistakes, we’re destined to repeat them.

In a tweet from April 20, 2020, I pondered, “At what point will the British public realize what has happened over the past nine weeks?” Fast forward to now, the Covid inquiry has just released its module 2 report, addressing the political response to the pandemic and providing an answer, albeit five years later.

Even at the onset, it was evident that the UK government’s delayed and disorganized response was leading to dire consequences: tens of thousands of deaths and a severe lockdown. The report highlights what many suspected at the time. Had the UK emulated the strategies of countries like South Korea, Denmark, Norway, and New Zealand, which focused on containment, it might have avoided multiple lockdowns and a significant number of deaths in 2020. From the early days of 2020, other nations demonstrated effective pandemic management through early intervention and robust public health systems centered on testing, tracing, and isolation.

The report paints a picture of a distracted and absentee Prime Minister, Boris Johnson, who was poorly advised and operating amid a dysfunctional environment in No 10. This lack of trust extended to devolved administrations. The irony was palpable: while citizens were instructed to stay home and not travel, airports remained open without passenger checks. It was like trying to drain a bathtub while leaving the faucet running—completely illogical.

By summer 2020, the UK government, under the leadership of Chancellor Rishi Sunak, introduced the “eat out to help out” scheme. Without consulting scientists or devolved governments, this initiative inadvertently sparked a second wave by encouraging people to gather in high-risk venues. The omission of support for takeaway services, which could have aided struggling hospitality businesses, added to the bewilderment.

For transparency, I provided both written and oral evidence for this module of the inquiry. From February 2020, my team at the University of Edinburgh redirected a significant Wellcome Trust grant to tackle Covid. Analyzing international data, we advocated for suppressing the virus as much as possible and swiftly addressing any emerging clusters until a vaccine was available. Genomic studies reveal that Scotland successfully eradicated initial virus strains before they were reintroduced through travel in summer 2020. Once again, it’s futile to empty a bathtub if the tap remains open. Yet, this is all a reiteration of past events.

The Covid story has a relatively happy ending: vaccines saved us from a disastrous future and delinked cases and hospitalisations, bringing the death rate from Covid below that of seasonal flu. The heroes of the Covid story are science and the NHS (and immigration, as even Johnson attested to, given the international healthcare team who treated him for severe Covid in hospital).

Reflecting on the report, I can’t help but wonder what it adds to our understanding of what happened politically, and what lessons it offers for the future. It’s an eye-wateringly expensive undertaking: it has already cost almost £200m, and Scotland is having its own ongoing inquiry at a cost of £45m. Most of these costs are for the legal teams. Compare this with all the independent scientists on expert advisory groups who worked pro bono for hundreds of hours over two years. I can’t see anything in the module 2 report that hasn’t already been covered in published books, articles and analysis about what happened and why.

From a scientific perspective, the report could never hope to provide one off-the-shelf plan for responding to every pathogen with pandemic potential. The response to one virus won’t work for another and each is dependent on the characteristics of the specific outbreak. What we really need for our politicians to respond effectively to the next potential pandemic are agile leadership, smart decision-making, flexibility, humility and trustworthiness. How does one build those into a political system?

Yes, the Covid story is about incompetence and failed leadership in UK government. But how does one learn lessons from this in a democracy that lets people vote for the party they want to lead the country? Surely it’s about voting in competence over entertainment. Voting in those who are detail-oriented, thorough and hardworking. I think of Jacinda Ardern as an example of someone with these qualities – and why New Zealand fared so well during the pandemic.

I hold out more hope for the inquiry report on government procurement when it is released. The more shocking story of the pandemic was the corruption enabled by Conservative government ministers. Analysis by the New York Times of 1,200 government contracts worth nearly $22bn during the pandemic found that almost half went to companies run by friends and associates of Conservative party politicians, or those with no experience in the area. Jolyon Maugham highlighted the “vast financial rewards you could reap if you had a minister looking out for your interests”. His Good Law Project estimates that more than £4 in every £5 spent on PPE was wasted or lost.

Some people see suffering and want to help. Some see the same situation and think easy money. What the inquiry could do is recommend legislation that safeguards the system and taxpayers’ pounds against profiteering in a crisis. This has to be done now, in a time of “peace”. We need strict rules so that even when certain greedy types think a disaster is a chance to get rich off the public dime, and politicians are willing to enable it, the law prevents it from happening.

I can’t help but think of Michelle Mone, who has become the face of this hidden group of pandemic profiteers. Why don’t we call legislation to protect taxpayers’ money – and improve trust in our politicians and government – the Dame Michelle Mone Law? That would be a great recommendation to come from the next part of the inquiry.

• Prof Devi Sridhar is chair of global public health at the University of Edinburgh

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