Several public health experts stressed to us that an effective messaging and communications strategy was a crucial part of the response to a pandemic. In July 2020, Sir Paul Nurse argued in evidence to the Health and Social Care Committee that “communication, messaging and keeping trust” should be one of the core focuses of the Government’s strategy.218 This was echoed by Sir Jeremy Farrar, who explicitly linked consistent messaging to public compliance with other NPIs: 211 NERVTAG is an expert committee of the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC), which advises the Chief Medical Officer (CMO) and, through the CMO, Ministers, DHSC and other Government departments. 212 Oral evidence taken before the Science and Technology Committee on 23 December 2020, HC (2019–21) 136, Q1612 213 GOV.UK, ‘Prime Minister’s statement on coronavirus (COVID-19): 19 December 2020’, and HC Deb, 6 January 2021, cols 734–736 [Commons Chamber] 214 GOV.UK, ‘Cases in the UK: Coronavirus in the UK—cases by date reported’, accessed 17 August 2021 215 GOV.UK, ‘Deaths in the UK: Coronavirus in the UK—Deaths within 28 days of positive test by date reported’, accessed 17 August 2021 216 Ourworldindata, SARS-CoV-2 variants in analyzed sequences, United Kingdom, accessed 2 September 2021 217 According to the Office for National Statistics, the second wave was estimated to be between 7 September 2020 to 24 April 2021. 218 Oral evidence taken before the Health and Social Care Committee on 21 July 2020, HC (2019–2021) 36, Q589 54 Coronavirus: lessons learned to date Consistent messaging and trust in the messaging is absolutely vital. If you are asking anybody—the community or the public—to do things that they would not normally do, they have to trust the message and the messenger, and that has to be consistent over time.219