Chief medical advisor: I’ve not seen footage of crowds at Bobby Storey’s funeral

Dr McBride also declined to give an opinion about whether he thought top Sinn Fein figures had breached health guidance (which he helped to draw up) by appearing at the funeral whilst pandemic restrictions were still in place.

He had previously called upon Black Lives Matter protestors, who gathered in defiance of the guidance and the law, not to “put vulnerable people at risk”.

Asked about the Storey funeral on the Nolan Show on Friday, he said: “It is not my role as chief medical officer to provide interpretation in relation to the guidance.

“The guidance is there for good reason so if we’re talking in generalities, which we now are, we do recognise there is an increased risk of transmission of Covid-19 where families and communities come together following the death of a loved one from any cause.”

Despite the fact it has dominated the news agenda for a dozen days, he also said: “I still haven’t seen the media footage, but I have heard of the reports and obviously the coverage around this...

“We’ve had a number of high profile events in terms of protests, for understandable reasons in terms of Black Lives Matter, [but] I absolutely appreciate the hurt and concern some of those images as described may have caused for others who have not been able to attend funerals.

He apologised “unreservedly” for the fact they had been forced to restrict access to funerals during the lockdown.

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