“To be frank, we are responsible for some pretty dramatic, pretty public mistakes — from testing, to data, to communications.” — Rochelle Walensky, Director, Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (August 2022)

When America’s leading disease control official admits to dramatic mistakes during the Covid-19 pandemic, Bermuda should pay attention. Our government closely followed CDC guidance, often implementing stricter versions of its policies. Yet while international health authorities acknowledge serious failures, our government insists everything we did was necessary and correct.

That is becoming impossible to defend.

Our Covid response was aggressive by any measure. We maintained some of the region's longest lockdowns. Emergency powers meant to last weeks stretched into years. Policies shifted without explanation. Travel restrictions ignored natural immunity from prior infection, even as worldwide evidence supported it.

The costs were real.

Businesses closed permanently during the lockdowns that our neighbours had ended. Families were separated under quarantine rules that dismissed scientific evidence. People suffered adverse vaccine reactions after taking shots mandated for employment or travel. Mental health crises surged.

The Government's defence was always the same: we followed the science, we followed the CDC. That defence now crumbles. The CDC admits it did not follow the science as carefully as claimed. Dr Walensky's admission was not minor. She acknowledged the CDC failed despite 75 years of preparation.

Congressional investigations found the agency often decided policy first — universal masking, vaccine mandates, school closures — then searched for supporting data. That is the opposite of evidence-based medicine.

The failures were fundamental.

ProPublica documented a “cataclysmic chain of mistakes” in test development that delayed America’s entire response. Johns Hopkins researchers called inadequate early testing “the crucial failure” preventing containment. These were not small errors; they were systemic breakdowns at the agency setting global standards.

Congressional oversight found that healthcare workers lost jobs because the CDC failed to recognise natural immunity alongside vaccine protection. The science supported natural immunity, but CDC policy ignored it.

Bermudians faced identical problems — Sophia Cannonier and Michael Watson’s legal challenge centred on exactly this issue. Britain established a formal inquiry. Canada did, too. These are not blame exercises; they’re about learning from mistakes. The World Health Organisation commissioned reports that found “a series of failures” in the global response. Pharmaceutical companies face scrutiny about the effectiveness of their products and for withholding complication data.

Bermuda has done nothing. No inquiry. No review. Just insistence that everything was necessary. Bermuda’s other accountability mechanisms failed. Parliament rubber-stamped emergency extensions with minimal debate. The media echoed government messaging rather than questioning policies. Professional groups and community organisations stayed silent about whether restrictions remained justified.

The Cannonier-Watson case shows the problem. Both had documented prior Covid infection. They challenged travel restrictions, treating natural immunity as irrelevant. The court upheld government policy without examining scientific evidence — evidence now internationally accepted.

The Collective Action Solidarity Trust lawsuit, filed three years ago and once called premature, does more than seek individual remedies. It documents:

• Businesses that failed during excessive lockdowns

• Medical injuries from mandated vaccines requiring ongoing treatment

• Families separated with lasting psychological damage

• Financial losses from rules later deemed disproportionate elsewhere

This documentation matters for future crises. When the next pandemic arrives, we need data about what our policies accomplished versus what they cost. We may also miss the opportunity to learn if we pretend to be perfect.

In October 2021, Glenn Fubler wrote that physicians signing an open letter urging vaccination were exercising “integrity, with their collective sense of responsibility” honouring the Hippocratic principle to “first, do no harm”. He praised their reliance on evidence showing vaccinated populations had better protection than unvaccinated ones.

That evidence-based approach was exactly right for October 2021. But Fubler’s own recent writing recognises something crucial: transformation requires “a paradigm appreciating that we are all always learning”. He notes that addressing complex crises demands “a healthy sense of humility, thus promoting collaboration”.

Here is where Bermuda’s pandemic accountability breaks down. When prevailing authorities fail to keep learning — when they claim perfection despite mounting international evidence of mistakes — someone must exercise the responsibility that Fubler described. Someone must ensure the learning continues.

The CDC learnt. It admitted dramatic mistakes. Britain and Canada established inquiries to learn more. Bermuda's authorities refuse to learn, insisting no mistakes occurred despite following guidance now acknowledged as flawed.

That is why Cast’s legal action became necessary. Not because courts are ideal for evaluating public health policy, but because when institutions stop learning, citizens must create mechanisms that force continued learning.

Fubler rightly notes that “like all of us, he is always learning” when discussing civic contributions. That principle applies equally in government. Covid was serious. The Government needed to act; no one disputes this. The question is whether responses remained proportionate, evidence-based and subject to genuine review as new evidence emerged.

Good emergency governance has features that Bermuda's response lacked. Emergency powers need automatic expiration requiring substantive legislative debate, not rubber stamps. Policies need continuous review as evidence evolves, with mechanisms to adjust measures that are no longer justified. Decision-makers should explain what triggers restrictions and what evidence justifies removing them. Most critically, people harmed by government mandates deserve fair compensatory processes, not years of expensive litigation for a hearing.

When Dr Walensky admits dramatic mistakes in guidance that Bermuda followed, claiming flawless local implementation becomes absurd. The question is not whether errors occurred; international authorities settled that. The question is whether Bermuda joins peer democracies in honest assessment or stands alone, claiming infallibility.

Fubler wrote that addressing the pandemic “reminds us of the need for all of us to work together towards an integrated whole”. Integration requires honest acknowledgement of what worked and what did not. It requires the humility to admit mistakes. It requires continuing to learn.

Cast’s lawsuit responds to extraordinary circumstances where ordinary democratic checks failed and authorities stopped learning. When the institutions we followed admit comprehensive failure while our government claims perfection, someone must take responsibility for ensuring accountability and continued learning.

Three years ago, these questions seemed premature. Today, with the CDC admitting failure, Bermuda’s denial looks isolated. Our citizens deserve the honest reckoning other democracies undertake — whether officials provide it voluntarily or courts compel it.

Congressional investigators noted that CDC problems “are not new”, with mistakes during Ebola and Zika emergencies. What made Covid different was “the scale of the emergency and the impact of those failures”.

For Bermuda, following flawed CDC guidance, the impact was proportionately significant — and remains unaddressed. Fubler is right that transformation requires “all hands on deck” and recognition “that we are all always learning”. The question is what happens when those in authority stop learning, stop acknowledging new evidence and stop demonstrating the humility necessary for genuine accountability.

Someone must take responsibility for ensuring the learning continues. That is not opposition; it is a civic duty when prevailing authorities fail theirs.

• Eugene Dean is a trustee of the Collective Action Solidarity Trust, representing Bermudians seeking accountability for pandemic response measures through continued learning and honest assessment