A strange thing happened last week. An awful lot of British voters discovered they were much more attached to Boris Johnson than they realised. Since Brexit, the UK prime minister has been a divisive figure, but his struggle with Covid-19 left all but his most partisan foes shocked, scared and desperate for news of recovery. One ex-cabinet colleague observed: “It reminded people of why they liked him when he was mayor of London.”
In such times the country would be fearful for any leader, but Mr Johnson’s vitality made his brush with death more shocking. On news of his recovery, one newspaper seemed to forget the nearly 1,000 deaths that day, declaring on its front page: It “really is a Good Friday”.
Mr Johnson was already a powerful premier with a particularly regal edifice around him — a court of close aides in Downing Street and a largely untested cabinet. Even so, before he got sick it was possible to see him politically undone by the crisis, not least over the laggardly response and early errors.