Boris was advising away until his heart was content, he was telling the public not go to to clubs etc for a while before they closed it down. The advice was there, its the actions that count.
I just have an overall problem with how this was handled from the start. There were calls for special protection of care homes that were ignored, there had to be a public outcry to cancel Paddys Day and the pubs themselves etc etc. Leo was even out in America in anticipation of it. We thundered ahead with closures and speeches while in discussion with NI, not informing them about our actions and pissing them off to the point an all island plan was abandoned and proclaiming our pokiticians to be grandstanding
We arent even performing that well per capita, we just spent the first few months condescendingly laughing at Boris and Trump while doing little ourselves to the point we were blaming nurses for not washing their hands for the entire spread and the UK even went into lockdown before us. Our early assessment has as many goof soundbites as the other countries that are so called struggling.
Our governent, by and large, doesnt act until theres a demand for it. Face masks is the next demand that theyll give in to.
I just think its all a bit of a myth and im rambling a bit but the difference between us and UK is their government were voted into power and ours want to work their way back in. Thats why they give into public outcries which seems proactive on the surface but thats all it is.