Boris Johnson suggested 'Covid was nature’s way of dealing with old people,' scientist claims

Boris Johnson suggested he believed the coronavirus pandemic was “nature’s way of dealing with old people” as he resisted lockdown measures, a former government scientist has claimed.

Sir Patrick Vallance, who was the government’s chief scientific adviser during the pandemic, wrote that the then-prime minister suggested he may have agreed with Conservatives that the “whole thing is pathetic”. The official Covid-19 inquiry heard on Tuesday that the scientist had hit out about “quite a bonkers set of exchanges” featuring Mr Johnson in his diaries.

The adviser wrote in August 2020 that Mr Johnson was "obsessed with older people accepting their fate and letting the young get on with life and the economy going". Then, in December 2020, Sir Patrick wrote that Mr Johnson said he believed he had been "acting early" and that the "public are with him (but his party is not)".

READ MORE: In full - the incredible WhatsApp messages and notes SLAMMING Boris Johnson and showing lockdown chaos in Government

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"He says his party ‘thinks the whole thing is pathetic and Covid is just Nature’s way of dealing with old people – and I am not entirely sure I disagree with them," he wrote. "A lot of moderate people think it is a bit too much’. Wants to rely on polling. Then he says ‘We should move things to Tier 3 now’."

Lee Cain, who was Mr Johnson’s communications director in No 10, said Mr Johnson’s erratic decision-making was “rather exhausting”. Messages between Mr Cain and Dominic Cummings, who served as the then-prime minister’s chief adviser, showed them venting their frustrations on WhatsApp.

Mr Cain said the then-PM was indecisive over whether or not to impose