Jack Grey
BBC Wales News

That concludes Tuesday's live coverage of the UK Covid Inquiry – we’ve heard from Dr Andrew Goodall, NHS Wales' boss during Covid and Public Health Wales boss Dr Tracey Cooper.

Here’s what we’ve learned:

• A mass testing centre was built in Cardiff without the Welsh government or Public Health Wales having any idea about it
• First Minister Mark Drakeford says in written evidence that Covid was "not a top priority" until after February 2020
• Wales' NHS bosses were not invited to early Covid Cobra meetings as there was a constraint on "attendance numbers", says Goodall
• In written evidence, then-Health Minister Vaughan Gething says some of the PPE available in the early days of the pandemic was "not fit for purpose"
• Goodall says that, with hindsight, the discharge of vulnerable hospital patients into care homes "could’ve been targeted differently"

We'll be back at 10:00 on Wednesday when we'll be hearing from Dr Quentin Sandifer, a pandemic adviser for Public Health Wales.

We hope you can join us tomorrow.

Image source, Getty Images

Cooper is read back a letter she wrote in March 2020 in which she said there was "no value" in testing care home residents if they did not have Covid symptoms.

Public Health Wales later changed its policy in light of new evidence on asymptomatic transmission.

“At that point the case definition didn’t include residents in care homes, other than people who were symptomatic. The testing world was in different space," she says.

"If someone had a negative test, it didn’t mean they weren’t incubating Covid. The world changed significantly as we went into April and May."

Cooper says the scaling up of pandemic resources did not happen early on as nobody expected it to last as long as it did.

“Dr Goodall mentioned earlier that he thought it might be initially a 13-week epidemic but of course by the time we got into [cases] heading up again by the middle of the year, that was the tipping point,” she says.

“Towards the end of August we saw rates really kicking up again… then it was clear this was going to be a rolling pandemic.”

By August, about 5,500 tests were being authorised a day, compared to 1,100 a day in the pandemic period up to the end of May.

Owain Clarke
BBC Wales Health Correspondent

Image source, Getty Images

Cooper recalls the first discussion about Covid she had with Wales' chief medical officer Frank Atherton on 27 February 2020.

She says they spoke about the situation in Italy and both realised the scale of the threat the virus would soon pose in Wales.

She describes the conversation as "sobering" and suggested others found it difficult to "tangibly recognise what was coming".

Image source, Getty Images

On Monday, the inquest heard that Jane Runeckles, First Minister Mark Drakeford's special adviser, switched on WhatsApp’s auto-delete function in November 2021.

We will hear from Drakeford himself next week, however he repeatedly refused to answer questions in the Senedd on Tuesday about his use of WhatsApp during Covid.

The outgoing first minister, who will step down in 11 days, says he will not offer a "preview" of the answers he will give the inquiry.

The inquiry has heard claims that Drakeford regularly used the app, however he previously said he used it "very little".

Image source, Getty Images

A mass Covid test centre was set up in Cardiff during the pandemic without the Welsh government or Public Health Wales (PHW) having any idea about it, says Cooper.

She says on about 1 April 2020, Deloitte, a private firm, informed PHW that it had set up a mass test centre at Cardiff City Stadium after being told to do so by the UK government.

"Unfortunately, neither ourselves or Welsh government knew about that. I don’t know who made the decision," she says.

She adds that over the course of “four or five days” PHW went from being unaware of the site's existence to staffing and running it.

“The reason being it was there and we couldn’t not use it - but it hadn't been planned."

We're back underway and Public Health Wales boss Dr Tracey Cooper is fielding questions from the inquiry - we'll be bringing you all the updates as they come throughout the afternoon.

However, the inquiry is not just looking hear from politicians and health officials, it also wants to hear from you.

Anyone can share their experience through the inquiry's Every Story Matters, external project.

The Covid-19 Bereaved Families for Justice campaign group - which criticised the UK government's handling of the pandemic - urged the inquiry to ensure these voices are heard.

All the public hearings are being streamed on the BBC News website and the inquiry's YouTube channel, external and witness transcripts are published on the inquiry website, external. Members of the public can also apply to attend in person.

A total of 10,262 people in Wales have died due to Covid - with a further 2,289 deaths listing Covid as a contributing factor.

• The first confirmed coronavirus case was on 28 February 2020 in Swansea from a patient who had travelled back from holiday in Italy.
• The first death in Wales from Covid occurred on 15 March 2020 in a 68-year-old Wrexham hospital patient.
• The first wave peaked with 73 deaths on a single day in April 2020.
• Covid's second wave in the winter of 2020-21 brought 83 deaths on 11 January 2021 alone - the worst single day of the pandemic in Wales.
• Nearly a fifth (17%) of all Covid deaths registered have occurred in care homes.

This morning we've heard evidence from Dr Andew Goodall, NHS Wales’ boss during Covid - here’s the key things we've learned:

• The health service in Wales should have acted sooner in early 2020 and not relied so heavily on modelling, says Goodall
• Inquiry counsel Tom Poole KC reports that First Minister Mark Drakeford said in written evidence that Covid was "not a top priority" until after February 2020
• Wales' NHS bosses were not invited to early Covid Cobra meetings as there was a constraint on "attendance numbers", says Goodall
• Some PPE available to the NHS early in the pandemic was "not fit for purpose", according to former Health Minister Vaughan Gething in his written evidence.

After lunch we'll hear more from Dr Tracey Cooper, chief executive of Public Health Wales.

Image source, Covid Inquiry

Next to face the inquiry is Dr Tracey Cooper, Public Health Wales' boss since 2014.

In May 2020, Cooper said she was "not familiar" with the Welsh government's then-target of 9,000 Covid tests a day, which the first minister described as "puzzling".

The inquiry is now adjourning for lunch so we'll hear more from Cooper after 13:45.

Image source, Getty Images

Gething believed that a small amount of the PPE available during the initial weeks of the pandemic was "not fit for purpose", the inquiry hears.

Bethan Harris, on behalf of the Bereaved Families for Justice Cymru, reads an extract of the former health minister's witness statement in which he said the government “underestimated how quickly the PPE stockpile would be used up".

“Frankly... a small amount of our stockpile was not fit for purpose,” he added.

Goodall tells the inquiry he agrees with Gething and the initial 13-week supply of PPE in Wales "ran down very quickly".

Steve Duffy
BBC Wales

In early March, health officials were presented with modelling for a reasonable worst scenario, which projected a need for 900 critical care beds in Wales when there usually capacity for 152.

The modelling was for more than half the Welsh population developing Covid symptoms with a “high proportion” needing hospital care, so NHS capacity in Wales would be "significantly exceeded".

As pandemic progressed the first wave peaked at 164 Covid patients in critical care, as this chart shows.

Steve Duffy
BBC Wales News

Goodall says that, with hindsight, the discharge of vulnerable hospital patients into care homes "could’ve been targeted differently".

He says it was about creating capacity in hospitals and there was some expectation that care homes could operate isolation procedures and provide a safer environment.

He adds that his worries were that hospitals were areas where patients were likely to be exposed to Covid, so there was something about trying to "find the safest environment for people in our system".

Was Wales too slow to react?published at 11:58 Greenwich Mean Time 5 March

11:58 GMT 5 March

Owain Clarke
BBC Wales Health Correspondent

Image source, Getty Images

One of the most significant lines of questioning concerns when the Welsh government fully realised the threat of the Covid-19.

Goodall speaks of a “trigger point” happening in late February and early March.

However, the inquiry asks whether that should have happened sooner, when evidence suggested the virus could be passed on even if someone wasn't displaying symptoms.

On 13 March the Welsh government took the unprecedented step of cancelling pretty much all non-emergency NHS activity to free up all available capacity to deal with the virus.

Asked whether enough thought was given to the knock-on effects on others, for example on people waiting for other treatments, Goodall says the NHS “may well have adjusted some of those decisions” if it had known the duration of the pandemic.

Ben Price
BBC News

Goodall tells the inquiry that, in hindsight, action should have been taken sooner to prepare the NHS for the full impact of the virus.

He says, prior to Wales' first case on 28 February, the NHS was relying on "worst case scenario" modelling and previous experiences such as the swine flu pandemic in 2009.

"The reasonable worst case scenarios - there’s a danger of seeing them as the forecast, that they are likely and they will happen," he says

"In fact, our swine flu experience told us different. Our reflections after that event was we couldn’t rely on our reasonable worst case scenarios."

Questioning Goodall, inquiry counsel Tom Poole KC says First Minister Mark Drakeford said in written evidence that Covid was "not a top priority for the Welsh government" in January and February 2020.

Goodall says there was "a change, certainly in our response in Wales, that was in the last week of February and certainly into early March".

Wales' first confirmed case of Covid was 28 February and the first death was recorded on 15 March.

Asked if he attended Cobra meetings in January and February 2020, Goodall says he "wasn't directly invited" and it was up to the minister or first minister who would accompany them.

He says there was a constraint on "attendance numbers" which meant he was not able to go.

Image source, Getty Images

Image source, Getty Images

Goodall says military personnel drafted in to help with planning and logistics in the early weeks of the pandemic were “extraordinary”.

"Importantly they weren’t just available to us in our national role, they committed their time and support to every individual health organisation in Wales."

He says he was "really impressed" with their help planning field hospitals and later around vaccination planning.

Image source, Covid Inquiry

First up is Dr Andew Goodall, permanent secretary to the Welsh government - Wales' most senior civil servant.

He is the successor to Dame Shan Morgan, who we heard from yesterday.

She told the inquiry she had deleted "some" early WhatsApp messages about Covid as a form of "housekeeping".

Before taking up his current role, Goodall was boss of the Welsh NHS throughout most of the pandemic.

His choices and decision-making during that time are set to be scrutinised by the inquiry.

Jack Grey
BBC Wales News

Good morning and welcome back to our live coverage as the UK Covid inquiry spends its second week in Wales.

On Monday we heard from Wales former top civil servant Shan Morgan and both Wales’ chief medical officer, Frank Atherton, and chief scientific adviser for health, Rob Orford, here are the key things we learned:

• Frank Atherton told the inquiry that Vaughan Gething, the then-health minister and current Welsh Labour leadership hopeful, incorrectly told the Welsh cabinet in February 2020 that no Covid had reached the UK when nine cases had been reported a week earlier
• Atherton conceded that Wales should have copied England when it made face coverings mandatory in public places as the different rules became “problematic”
• He also labelled the lack of information surrounding different UK restrictions during times of pandemic an "omnishambles"
• The inquiry was told First Minister Mark Drakeford said locking down small areas during the autumn of 2020 was a "failed experiment”

Today we will be hearing from Dr Andrew Goodall, Wales’ current top civil servant and Dr Tracey Cooper, the boss of Public Health Wales.

You can follow the latest developments from the hearing here or watch it live by tapping the play button at the top of this page.