Is Britain’s coronavirus response bogged down in bureaucracy?

The NHS has rightly been praised for its response to coronavirus. But it still isn’t quite the model of efficiency it could be. And there remains a problem with how British medical bureaucracy is handling the treatment of hospitalised Covid patients. 

Hard-pressed consultants are reportedly being forced to swap news in WhatsApp groups about possible cutting-edge treatments. These doctors are desperate for information which may help their Covid patients in hospital either stay out of intensive care or, if unlucky enough to be in ICU, improve the 50/50 odds of life or death once on ventilation. Why? It seems likely that doctors are forced to innovate off the record because of the bureaucracies we’re all too often lumbered with in the medical world. Public Health England and Britain’s other stifling quangos are too process-driven and all-too-often too risk-averse to be able to respond to the nimbleness being shown by consultants at the top of their game across the world, who are willing to dare all and do everything possible to try and save patients’ lives.