Last week, UK Health Secretary Matt Hancock ordered an urgent review of the daily COVID-19 death statistics produced by Public Health England, after it emerged that they included people who had previously tested positive for COVID-19 in their statistics for England's COVID-19 deaths outside hospital, but without any checks on the actual cause of death.

Apparently, the PHE cross-checks the latest notifications of deaths against the NHS COVID-19 test database for those who tested positive – whenever that test was performed; so, anyone who has ever tested positive is likely to be recorded in the list of COVID-19 deaths if they die at any later date. Perhaps even if they were run over by a car? If this is true, it will result in an inflation of the deaths estimate and a skewing of data towards a more elderly population and towards deaths in care homes, as, naturally, this is the demographic with the highest mortality rate, i.e., most likely to die from any cause.

Again, if true, this unbelievably unprofessional methodology - attributable to either incompetence or a deliberate mismanagement of data, was still being defended by PHE in Monday's press. Additionally, relatives of hospital patients dying of old age but testing negative for COVID-19, are still claiming that COVID-19 is being recorded on their loved one's death certificate – with no post mortem, of course, these stopped months ago.

Such absurd methodology will ensure that, per misleading statistics, COVID-19 deaths will continue occurring indefinitely or at least for decades!

As the world learns more about the damage caused by SARS-nCoV-2, the new virus responsible for COVID-19, it is clear that some former COVID-19 patients may have their lives shortened by organ damage. Significantly, a post-COVID-19 follow-up study has been initiated, but the flawed PHE method will offer no insights whatsoever into this phenomenon. It takes a proper investigation and autopsy at the time of death. This is the only way pathologists learn about the in vivo effects of a new disease. So far, we have been reliant on information gleaned from post-mortem studies conducted in other countries.

Meanwhile, Cancer Research UK has flagged up the continuing scandal of the huge backlog in diagnostic tests for cancer, together with the cancelled surgeries and clinical trials. It seems the NHS was protected from a catastrophic failure in handling COVID-19 at the cost of a catastrophic failure in provision for cancer patients.

UKIP urges the Health Secretary to make clearing the cancer treatment backlog a priority and initiate a full review into the actions of the PHE, the NHS and the Government, during this pandemic.

Regards

Helena Windsor (Health Spokeswoman)