Matt Hancock reveals how 1 BILLION items of PPE were stuck in a warehouse trends now
Matt Hancock has revealed how one billion items of PPE were trapped in a warehouse at the start of the pandemic because it only had one door - meaning lorries delivering to hospitals and care homes had to queue up and be loaded one at a time.
In his new pandemic diaries, the former health secretary says he was 'absolutely furious' at the blunder, which led to delays sending millions of gowns, masks and gloves to NHS staff from a 'huge storage unit' in the North West of England in March 2020.
Exclusive extracts from Mr Hancock's book, being serialised in the Daily Mail and the Mail on Sunday, reveal that PPE provision to hospitals was already a 'total disaster' by the start of the first lockdown and that the NHS's supply chain had 'effectively collapsed'.
Mr Hancock also writes that, when Covid arrived in the UK, ministers had 'no clear record' of what PPE was in storage and soon learned that some was useless and already 'past its 'best before' date'.
A worker gathering supplies at the NHS' National Procurement Warehouse at Canderside, Larkhall
Matt Hancock has revealed how one billion items of PPE were trapped in a warehouse at the start of the pandemic because it only had one door - meaning lorries delivering to hospitals and care homes had to queue up and be loaded one at a time
On March 17, 2020, just six days before Boris Johnson announced the first national lockdown, Mr Hancock wrote: 'I've been told we have a billion items of PPE in a warehouse in the North West. 'Hooray!' I thought. Just one problem – we can't get it out. It turns out that it's in a huge storage unit with only one door. Ergo, only one lorry can pull up at a time. What a classic government fail.'
Within a fortnight, PPE deliveries to hospitals dried up, he said. At the time, some doctors and nurses were pictured wearing bin liners as aprons and ski goggles instead of protective glasses.
Mr Hancock described seeing pictures of the staff wearing bin liners after Northwick Park Hospital in north London ran out of aprons on March 21, 2020.
He said: 'My heart sank. It's completely unacceptable. Naturally we're being accused of sending these brave NHS staff to their potential doom by not giving them the protection they need.
'The absurdity of the situation is that we actually have enough – we just can't get it out of the damn warehouse.'
The following day the Army were brought in, he wrote.
'The Army is doing a great job on PPE delivery. Now I've seen what they can do, I want to get them involved in the proposed ExCel Centre temporary hospital. The PM is keen,' he said.
Then, on March 30, the former health secretary said deliveries had 'collapsed'. He explained that before the pandemic the Government was supplying 'small amounts' of PPE to 250 hospitals; now it had to send it to those trusts as well as 56,000 GPs and dentists and all care homes.
He wrote: 'Hats off to those who bought a billion items of PPE all those years ago – I just wish they'd put more thought into getting it out.
A patient is transported out of an ambulance by medics wearing PPE at the Royal London Hospital on January 2, 2021
