Is the failure to lockdown sooner really the main fault? South Korea hasn't had a lockdown and their number of fatalities is tiny compared to us, despite being much closer to the initial epicentre. What they did, which has proved hugely effective is mass testing and contract tracing. We have spectacularly failed to do that.
You could argue that South Korea had the experience of SARS to fall back on. But closer to home Germany is testing half a million a week, while in Britain, we have only recently achieved 10,000 a day. This is a national disgrace, wherever the fault lies. Germany has a much lower fatality rate than the UK.