Mike Gill: Whitehall has locked down its own capacity for flexible thinking

Summary

We are all in lockdown, but COVID-19 seems to have been the spur to all sorts of imaginative behaviours on the ground. For example, NHS care delivery has been redesigned at a pace unimaginable in more stable times. Everywhere, volunteering is showing what it can do in the age of social media.

However, in contrast those in and around Whitehall are responding poorly, says Mike Gill, former Regional Director of Public Health, South East England, in this BMJ blog. Effective crisis management demands flexibility and collaboration. We are seeing neither.