UK Covid-19 Inquiry - Module 1 report: progress update - July 2026

5. Using Data and Research

Recommendation Five – Data and Research for future pandemics

Chair’s recommendation:

The UK Government, working with the devolved governments, should establish mechanisms for the timely collection, analysis, secure sharing, and use of reliable data for informing emergency responses, in advance of future pandemics. Data systems should be tested in pandemic exercises.

The UK Government should also commission a wider range of research projects ready to commence in the event of a future pandemic. These could be ‘hibernated’ studies or existing studies that are designed to be rapidly adapted to a new outbreak. Better working with international partners should be encouraged. This should include projects to:

• Understand the prevalence of a new virus;
• Measure the effectiveness of a range of different public health measures; and
• Identify which groups of vulnerable people are hardest hit by the pandemic and why.

Implementation actions and timescales set out in our January 2025 response:

• The Scottish Government and partners will agree a framework setting out the processes for how analytical resource across the Scottish Government can be rapidly redeployed to respond to a future pandemic supporting the timely collection, analysis, sharing and use of required data and associated research and modelling by summer 2025.

Progress update as at July 2026:

• The Analytical Framework, which sets out how analytical resource will be deployed across the Scottish Government in the event of any future pandemic, was developed and tested during Exercise Pegasus and is now an operational working document. While lessons from the formal evaluation of Exercise Pegasus will inform refinement of the Framework, the Framework will also be kept under review through the Data and Analysis for Crisis Delivery Group. This will ensure it remains fit for purpose, reflects developments in analytical capability, and incorporates improvements in pandemic-relevant data and evidence.
• Forming part of the Framework, a Memorandum of Understanding outlining mechanisms to enable rapid sharing of data and analysis across the four nations, in preparation for or during a future crisis, has been signed by the Cabinet Office and devolved governments following agreement by Scottish Government Ministers.

The Scottish Government wrote to the inquiry chair on 18 May 2026 to confirm that this recommendation has been delivered and closed.