InfoSearched
Boris Johnson’s own fight with the virus he’s been telling Britain to stay home for just got a lot more serious.
Ten days after testing positive for COVID-19, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson was admitted to a London hospital on the evening of Sunday, April 5, for what Downing Street is calling precautionary tests. The 55-year-old had spent the previous week and a half self-isolating in an apartment inside 10 Downing Street, and officials say he’s still running the government from his hospital bed. The move comes as his own fiancée recovers from her own bout with the virus and as the Queen delivers a rare wartime-style address to a nation watching its case count climb.
- Johnson was admitted on doctor’s advice after 10 days of self-isolation because of “persistent” symptoms — a continuing high fever and cough — not because his condition had suddenly worsened, according to Downing Street.
- Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab has been designated to chair the daily coronavirus response meeting in Johnson’s absence, though No. 10 insists the Prime Minister remains in charge and is still receiving ministerial briefings.
- Johnson’s pregnant fiancée, Carrie Symonds, revealed she’d spent the prior week bedridden with coronavirus symptoms before recovering without ever being tested.
A Precautionary Step, Downing Street Insists
Johnson tested positive for COVID-19 on March 27, becoming the first head of government among major Western powers confirmed to have contracted the virus. He isolated inside Downing Street rather than checking into a hospital, releasing video updates in which he insisted he was managing “mild symptoms.” That message held for over a week — until Sunday night, when his personal physician recommended admission for tests after his fever and cough refused to break.
Downing Street was careful with its language, describing the hospitalization as “a precautionary step” rather than a sign of deterioration. Johnson’s last public appearance had come just three days earlier, on April 2, when he stepped out to join the nationwide “Clap for Carers” tribute to NHS workers — the same health service now treating him.
Current Executive Leadership Roles
Officials have been explicit that Johnson has not stepped back from his duties. Downing Street says he remains in contact with senior officials and continues to receive the ministerial red boxes and briefings that come with the job. Still, someone has to chair the government’s daily coronavirus meeting while the Prime Minister is in a hospital bed, and that job has fallen to Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab, who is next in the informal line of succession.
The arrangement leaves Britain in an unusual position: a sitting Prime Minister hospitalized with the same disease his government has spent weeks telling 66 million citizens to shelter against. For a country still building out the capacity described in earlier coverage of the U.S. and U.K.’s parallel struggles — see how the White House responded after its own staff contracted the virus — the symbolism of the moment isn’t lost on anyone in Whitehall.
A Household Battling the Virus
Johnson isn’t the only one in his household who has been fighting COVID-19. His fiancée, Carrie Symonds, who is pregnant, revealed she had spent the previous week bedridden with symptoms of the virus before recovering — without ever taking a test, since testing in the U.K. at that stage was still largely reserved for hospitalized patients and frontline workers.
Downing Street says the Prime Minister remains in charge of Her Majesty’s Government, in contact with officials and receiving regular briefings — even from his hospital bed.
The dual illness in one household underscored just how far the virus had already reached into the machinery of British government by early April, months into a pandemic that had already forced the American president’s own coronavirus task force into daily national briefings, as chronicled when President Trump and the First Lady later tested positive themselves.
World Leaders and the Queen Weigh In
News of Johnson’s hospitalization drew immediate reaction from foreign capitals. President Donald Trump, addressing reporters during a coronavirus task force briefing, called Johnson a friend and said he expected the hospital visit to be “routine,” wishing him a swift recovery. Other world leaders followed with similar messages of support as the story of a hospitalized head of government spread across international news.
The timing lined up almost precisely with Queen Elizabeth II’s rare televised address to the nation, in which she promised that “better days will return” even as the U.K.’s infection tallies kept climbing. Two of Britain’s most recognizable figures — its head of state and its head of government — were speaking to the country’s fears on the same weekend, from very different positions: one from a broadcast studio, the other from a hospital ward.
For now, the question in Westminster isn’t about a succession crisis — Raab is chairing meetings, and No. 10 says Johnson is still weighing in from his hospital bed. The real number everyone’s watching is how long those “persistent” symptoms hang on, and whether the tests Johnson checked in for turn out to be as routine as Trump predicted.
Deadly Volcanic Eruption Hits New Zealand Island As Tourists Visit | NBC News
Joe Biden is working from home
Markets skyrocket after Biden’s Super Tuesday performance
New Yorkers Sing Together Out Windows during Coronavirus pandemic
Is the U.S. ready for a severe coronavirus outbreak?