LONDON – Boris Johnson has been “overwhelmed” by the data during the COVID-19 pandemic, a public inquiry into his government’s response to the global health crisis found on Monday.

Former chief scientific adviser Patrick Vallance said Johnson, who was prime minister at the time, sometimes had difficulty retaining scientific information.

In a May 4, 2020, entry recalling a meeting with Johnson about schools, Vallance wrote: “My God, this is complicated. Models will not provide an answer. PM is clearly confused.”

Another article written the same month said: “PM questions whether we have overstated the deadliness of this disease. He fluctuates between optimism, pessimism and then something like that.”

Vallance wrote in June that watching Johnson grapple with the stats was hard work. “He finds relative and absolute risk difficult to understand,” he said.

In another notebook entry by Vallance, Johnson was described as “distressed” when he saw participants wearing face masks and social distancing at a Battle of Britain commemoration in September this year.

Vallance said Johnson, who was criticized at the inquiry by a number of former senior aides, described the scene as “crazy and scary, we have to stop it”.

“Start questioning numbers and questioning whether they really lead to deaths. He says it’s not exponential, etc., etc.,” he added, referring to Johnson.

Describing the leader’s attitude towards the spread of the virus, Vallance wrote: “Looked broken – often with his head in his hands. ‘Is it because of the great libertarian nation that we are that it spreads so widely?'”

“‘Maybe we’re done as a species’… ‘We’re too fucked up to get our shit together'”.

Vallance also told how then-finance minister Rishi Sunak was overheard at a meeting in July 2020 saying the government should deal with its scientific advisers rather than COVID-19.

At the time, there were plans to reopen the country after the first nationwide lockdown.

Other notes from Vallance in June 2020 claimed ministers had “not actually read the scientific advice or taken the time to understand it” when they wanted to lift the two-metre social distancing rule.

“No. 10 (Downing Street) is pushing hard for measures to be released – including clubs and bars. They push hard and want the science to change,” he wrote.

“We have to keep our hats on. There will probably be a second peak,” he added.

The inquiry, led by a retired senior judge, is due to question Johnson and Sunak, the current prime minister, later this year.

Johnson’s term as prime minister ended after a series of scandals, including parties that broke the lockdown in Downing Street.