‘A year ago, I could not have imagined what kind of storm we would be facing. We were caught completely off guard. Then came the switch to crisis management mode, having no time to lose if we wanted to save lives. I would like to pay tribute to the commitment our staff showed at the time. However, the second wave was far too much. Particularly as this could have been avoided for the most part. And yet our people kept on going. By and large, the population has also coped exceptionally well. The main failings during the first wave were at the governmental level. All the various crisis management rules were blatantly violated at the time’.