The government has not paid enough attention to the long-term collateral damage of lockdowns, according to a majority of British scientists surveyed.
A wide-ranging survey by The Telegraph and Censuswide shows that almost seven in ten (68 percent) academics believe more attention should have been paid to the impact of the country's lockdown.
The positions are in stark contrast to public discourse at the height of the pandemic, when only a few dissenting scientific voices spoke out to highlight the health and economic risks of lockdowns.
While just over half (51 percent) of scientists thought lockdowns were always proportionate and always justified, a third disagreed.
The survey also found that while 44 percent of scientists thought pandemic modeling was 'excellent' or 'good', some 37 percent thought it was 'average', 'poor' or 'very poor' .
Experts said the results showed there was far less scientific consensus than the public was led to believe, and warned that many academics at the time felt unable to express their views.
Scientists feared loss of patronage
Prof. Robert Dingwall, former government Covid adviser, from Nottingham Trent University, said: "It was always clear to those of us who were able to provide evidence-based criticism of 'official science' and government actions that we had significant tacit enjoyed support in the scientific community.
"However, this was tempered by concerns about loss of patronage, access to research grants and difficulties in publication as well as the cost of speaking out.
"Others have certainly paid a price for their attempts to express loyal opposition. I don't blame anyone for keeping their head down when they have to build a career, support a family or prefer a quiet life."
Bob Seeley, a Tory MP who spoke out against lockdowns during the pandemic, said: "At the time we were, understandably, focused on immediate risks.
"However, it was also clear that very little attention was paid to the long-term damage to a society, especially to the development of young people. Schools should never have been closed. We see a generation of young people being damaged.
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"There was too much politics from some scientists promoting a politicized agenda."
He added: "The lack of interest in the origins of the virus seems bizarre.
"My fear is that the lockdown will at least be seen as an ineffective way of dealing with the crisis. The lack of an open and scientifically led conversation during the crisis was, in my opinion, troubling."
A generation scarred
Last month, the World Bank warned that the disruption to education caused by the lockdown would damage multiple generations of children who would suffer serious developmental and learning delays.
NHS waiting lists rose to a record 7.8 million last September and there have been tens of thousands of extra non-Covid deaths since the pandemic, especially among heart and cancer patients.
A University College London study in February estimated that 12,000 years of life were lost in Britain due to delays in skin cancer diagnosis during Covid lockdowns.
Gordon Wishart, chief medical officer at Check4Cancer, and visiting professor of cancer surgery at Anglia Ruskin University, repeatedly warned in 2020 and 2021 that delaying cancer diagnosis and treatment would lead to deaths, but said his fears were ignored.
"I felt like my concerns were falling on deaf ears as far as the government was concerned," he said.
"I really worry that we wouldn't do anything differently if we had another pandemic, as the Covid research didn't seem that interested in identifying what went wrong with our approach, and how we could do it next time change."
The Telegraph survey, conducted between December and February by 198 scientists from universities across Britain, also found that 70 percent believed government decisions were not transparent or not well communicated.
Only three percent believed that all scientific views had been considered by the government, while a third believed that officials had focused on only a minority of opinions.
Sunetra Gupta, professor of theoretical epidemiology at the University of Oxford, said it was important to prevent "abuse and persecution" of scientists willing to challenge the consensus.
"There are clearly systemic issues in academia that need to be addressed to enable a fuller debate on these critical issues," she said.
"In the future, I hope that universities and institutions such as the Royal Society, as well as the government and the media, will see fit to have more debates and allow dissenting voices to be heard."
The survey also found that scientists are divided over whether Covid-19 leaked from a laboratory, with the majority believing China has not been open and transparent about the origins of the disease.
About a third believe gain-of-function experiments - which increase the potency of viruses and bacteria - could cause a pandemic, while the same number think the work could help prevent future outbreaks.
Ravi Gupta, professor of clinical microbiology at the University of Cambridge, said: "I think the research shows that people believe in the ability of science to answer questions, but some of those experiments carry a risk and they are regulated must become.
"Now that the dust has settled, hopefully people can have a balanced discussion."
The survey, which addressed current controversial issues within science, also found that around six in 10 scientists think sex is binary, while a similar number agree that gender is fluid.
Responding to the inquiry, a spokesperson for the Department of Health and Social Care said: "Throughout the pandemic, the Government has acted to save lives and livelihoods, prevented the NHS from being overwhelmed, and has delivered a world-leading delivered a vaccine rollout that protected millions of people.
"We have always said that there are lessons to be learned from the pandemic and are committed to learning from the findings of the Covid-19 research, which will play a key role in informing the Government's planning and preparations for the future ."
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