What price resilience?

In formulating a policy towards creating a national resilience capability, it is clear that one thing is indisputable: prevention is always cheaper than cure. It is a point illustrated dramatically by the Covid-19 crisis. For countries like Taiwan, Singapore and several others the lessons they learnt from the past SARS and Swine Flu epidemics served them when Covid-19 struck. By being ready they had developed a core national resilience to what they saw as a likely future event.

While there are some things that makes it is easy to be sympathetic towards the UK government, such as the sheer volume of tactical and operational problems that a pandemic such as Covid-19 creates, there is one thing that is very difficult to forgive. That is the lack of basic preparation at the strategic level for a disease that was always going to happen.

Read the full article on our digital issue, pages 18-19.

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