Jim Reed
Reporting from the inquiry

The leader of the opposition, Kemi Badenoch, gave evidence earlier to the Covid inquiry. She served as equalities minister, alongside other roles, in previous Conservative administrations.

She was asked about misinformation and disinformation - that’s deliberate false information - that was spread about vaccines in the pandemic.

She said she was “less worried” about social media sites such as X (formerly Twitter) and Facebook as she felt publicly available information could be more easily challenged and corrected.

“The things that really concern me are the pieces of information that are less visible,” she said, giving the example of “family WhatsApp groups, things that the government has no insight into”.

That kind of rumour and misinformation, she suggested, was more difficult to deal with as it could “travel very quickly” through private channels.

Badenoch also said there was a “shortage of data” about the impact of the pandemic on ethnic minority groups.

“I remember us trying to find out the ethnicity of people dying, especially frontline ethnic minority workers. It took a long time to get this resolved,” she said.

Earlier Darius Hughes, the general manager of the drugs giant Moderna in the UK, said a new site for the research, develop and manufacturer of vaccines should start producing its first jabs in “August or early September” this year.

In 2022, the government signed a 10-year deal with Moderna to develop a new Innovation and Technology Centre in Harwell, Oxfordshire.

When fully up-and-running it will have the ability to produce 250m vaccine doses a year to protect the UK from any future pandemic, Hughes said.

Jim Reed
Reporting from the inquiry

It's the last week of this fourth section of the Covid inquiry. Since the start of the year hearings have been held looking just at the development and rollout of vaccines and therapeutic drugs in the pandemic.

Today we'll hear evidence from Darius Hughes, who runs the UK arm of the US drug company Moderna, which produced one of the three main COVID vaccines used in this country.

The now leader of the opposition Kemi Badenoch will testify. She'll be asked questions as former equalities minister in the Boris Johnson government.

After lunch it's the turn of another former minister, Nadhim Zahawi, who was responsible for vaccine deployment for a period.

And finally Dame Emily Lawson who was ultimately in charge the vaccine rollout itself for NHS England, the largest health drive of its type in the history of the health service.

Tomorrow we're expecting to hear from her counterparts in Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland.

Matt Spivey
Live page editor

Good morning. Conservative Party leader, and former minister for women and equalities, Kemi Badenoch will give evidence at the Covid inquiry today, as will former vaccines minister Nadhim Zahawi.

The inquiry, led by former judge and crossbench peer Baroness Hallett, will also be hearing from representatives of Moderna Biotech UK and NHS England.

Baroness Hallett has promised that the inquiry would be "thorough and fair", and examine how decisions on limiting the spread of Covid were made and communicated; as well as the use of lockdowns and the impact on children, healthcare workers and the clinically vulnerable.

The inquiry has heard from hundreds of witnesses since its first public hearing in June 2023, including representatives of the bereaved families, current and former politicians, civil servants and public health experts.

In July 2024, the first report published by the inquiry said the UK's flawed pandemic preparations had led to more deaths and greater economic damage than there should have been.

We'll be covering the Covid inquiry today as a stream-only page, which means we won't be providing regular text updates - you can follow along by clicking watch live at the top of this page from 10:30 GMT.