UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson and his fiancee, Carrie Symonds, announced Wednesday morning the birth of a baby boy. The couple plan to marry this summer; this will be Johnson's third marriage, and the first time in nearly 200 years that a British prime minister will have married while in office.
Johnson was only released from hospital two weeks ago, following a serious coronavirus infection that landed him in the ICU for three days, although he did not require artificial ventilation. He admitted afterward that "things could have gone either way," and his high profile contributed a great deal to the general public taking the severity of the epidemic more seriously.
"The NHS saved my life, no question," he said, while his fiancee was also recovering from a lighter bout of the illness that also affected Britain's Health Secretary, Matt Hancock, who made a swifter recovery than Johnson.
The British government has come under a great deal of fire lately for, among other things, an alleged failure to provide enough protective clothing for its health workers. Johnson paid tribute to their dedication on numerous occasions, praising their "personal courage, not just of the doctors and nurses but of everyone: the cleaners, the cooks, the healthcare workers of every description, physios, radiographers, pharmacists."
So far, 85 NHS workers and 23 social care workers have died of coronavirus in the United Kingdom.